Paul provided great material and manual and administrative help for the networking shift in my house today. We needed to get the last vestiges of my study removed from Kevin's room so we can finally start redecorating for him. There was cable dropped to the cable modem there, which connected to the wireless router, which connected to the telephone router, which connected to the phone lines in the house via a long wire that ran halfway around the room. This whole bunch of equipment now lives in the space above our refrigerator.
The splitter was over near the current TV drop and from there it was a short distance to the internet cable drop in Kevin's room. We replaced the splitter with a barrel connector (female on both ends) and connected to the old TV run which terminated on the living room wall on the back side of the fridge. Then we pulled a new cable up that hole with a barrel connecter temporarily binding the cables. The cable would not come out of the hole in the wall header that also had a couple of power cables running through it while the terminator was connected. The cieling drops down above the fridge, so the wall header is exposed and I could see the cable connection below the wood, but wasn't sure how to get down there and reach it. Kevin, who "Uncle Paul" must have authorized to climb around in the attic was sent into the tight space and returned successfully with the cable joint. I then pulled up an appropriate amount of the new cable and cut the terminator off the old one so I could get it out of there. The new cable end was sent down the hole above the fridge.
We pulled new cable from the fridge hole to the current TV drop. Using the barrel connector with the existing cable eliminated the need for fishing there. We pulled network cable to from the fridge area to Kevin's room per Lexie's request for future computer possibilities. Then Paul had to run for a couple hours. I got everything hooked up and working so that we were back to the same functionality we'd had before except with Kevin's room clear of the modem and routers.
After lunch we pulled both types of cable to my recently reclaimed study. This was in a fairly difficult part of the attic to reach, but I had been up earlier in the week to lay out some plywood sheets for platforms that made it doable. After a couple wrong placed holes, we got one in the right place. Then there was a moderately challenging drop and fish session, but we got the stuff there. I hooked up the network cable and was happy to be back to full speed on my desktop. We dropped the TV cable but did not hook it up. I anticipate buying a TV card for my computer and at that point will get another splitter for the cable behind the fridge. That cable and the one to the old TV drop are both disconnected.
We hope to get a little more slick with the telephone hookup soon, too. This will help clean up the look of the cables in the kitchen.
We finished right at two. Perfect timing to watch Germany beat Portugal.
Later I mowed the back yard in which the bermuda had grown quite high with the odd bits of rain we've recieved over the last week. It put quite a strain on the lawnmower and only through careful and patient work was I able to finish the yard before the battery had totally drained.
I also found time to watch the second half of the Dynamo's dismal July fourth draw with Columbus, kick the ball with Kevin (he actually let me work with him on new skills --his first headed goals-- tonight), order and retrieve a pizza, bathe Madeline, read to both kids, and write all this stuff.
Posted to Family and Home at July 8, 2006 11:12 PM