[00:00:00] Eric Goranson: It's around the house when it comes to remodeling and renovating your home. There is a lot to know though. We've got you covered. This is around the house. Welcome to the Around the House Show. This is where we talk everything home improvements, especially in our midweek special here where we don't fit stuff into last week's show.

[00:00:34] Eric Goranson: And of course, into this weekend show. Happy holidays. Happy Hanukkah. Merry Christmas to everybody out there. Can't believe that we are nearing the end of the year. Well, I wanted to talk today, kinda a little bit of a pivot here. You know, this morning, it's Tuesday here in, uh, my neck of the woods and, uh, this morning in, uh, north of San Francisco, in Ferndale, California, they had a [00:01:00] 6.4 Earth.

[00:01:01] Eric Goranson: At, uh, about 2:34 AM So they have had a heck of a mess over there. I think they've got 70,000 people without power. Lot, about a dozen aftershocks, at least two injuries, uh, reported. So it's kind of a big deal. And, uh, widespread damage have been reported to roads, homes through. Humboldt County pg e uh, has got an emergency response plan going, and this is a great reminder that I wanted to talk about today for a little bit about getting things ready for an earthquake.

[00:01:36] Eric Goranson: If you're in an area that has had an earthquake in the past, this is something you should pay attention to. I'm in Earthquakes area. I was actually living in Seattle in about what, 2001 during the Squali earthquake. That was that, uh, I think 6.9 that we had up there. And I was midspan on the Tacoma Narrows bridge, which was not the place I wanted to be.

[00:01:59] Eric Goranson: But one [00:02:00] thing I learned about it is what happens during a natural disaster like that. And these are the things that happen. First off, cell phone towers. Forget about it cuz everybody is on the phone at. and calling everybody. So think about how a sporting event or a concert you're trying to call somebody doesn't work well cuz everybody's trying to communicate.

[00:02:21] Eric Goranson: So you're gonna have a tough time communicating. Second of all, natural gas, water things that are piped coming into your house can have problems. So if part of your plan is to have natural gas, heat, and if the power goes out, Hey, I'm cool. I'm gonna be running the generator, you might not have natural gas and especially if you.

[00:02:41] Eric Goranson: One of those automatic shutoffs that are, you know, recommended for your gas line, that can be a bigger problem because that will shut off to the earthquake to make sure it's safe. That's great. But the issue is, is that if you had 70,000 people, let's say in your area that had natural gas, [00:03:00] they now have to go around, inspect your system and turn the gas back on and reset that.

[00:03:07] Eric Goranson: That can take days to weeks for that to happen. So I want you to really kind of think about that in your backup plan for heat if you're in an area that you have natural gas or cooking for that matter. So think about that. If your plan was to have the natural gas, barbecue, natural gas oven, or even natural gas cooktop, make sure you've got another source for.

[00:03:33] Eric Goranson: So it's just one of those things to think about. Now, of course, you know, go through all the emergency preparedness stuff, have the water, have the backup food, have the stuff that you would have for any other natural disaster. But one of the things we don't talk about enough, I think, is your home. If you have a house that's built before, let's say 1970, depending on where you're located, your house might not be attached to the foundation.

[00:03:59] Eric Goranson: [00:04:00] So in the seventies, sometimes even in the mid seventies, it didn't happen. I've seen homes that were built in Portland, Oregon, here in earthquake country, where in the mid seventies there's some, there's some framing nails that are holding that thing on that seal plate. Cuz what happens is, is they build the foundation nowadays, there's bolts that come up through that foundation and bolt down that seal plate, which is the basis of your house to the foundation.

[00:04:24] Eric Goranson: Most homes that are built before the seventies, Unless they've been retrofitted, only have the weight of the home holding it on there. So if you think about it, when you see those pictures of the tornado, for instance, and the tornado came through and you see this perfectly good looking house laying out in the middle of the street, yeah, that house was blown off its foundation.

[00:04:47] Eric Goranson: That would probably not have happened if it would've been tied down to the foundation. So that's one of those things you wanna make sure that you're, uh, pretty well dialed in. . Now, here's the other part that I'm concerned about with that [00:05:00] is that you can go through and have that done, but I really, if it's gonna be a DIY project, then my recommendation for going through and Simpson strong time makes some great brackets to do this.

[00:05:12] Eric Goranson: I would hire a structural engineer if you're gonna tackle this as a DIY project and have 'em call out what brackets need to go where so you can follow that plan. It's not that hard. But you just need to do all the right places. I'll see people that hire companies, for instance, to come in and do earthquake retrofits.

[00:05:30] Eric Goranson: Company comes around and they go, okay, we're just gonna tie the exterior of the house to the foundation. You know? That's great. That's cute. Awesome. They've only done part of the job because what I want to see is around there, that metal plate that holds the foundation concrete to the seal plate. I wanna see now brackets that hold.

[00:05:51] Eric Goranson: The floor joists to the silk plate, I wanna see a metal bracket to hold those there. I also want to, in that middle beam, in a [00:06:00] basement that's common, I wanna see those same ones onto the beam, and I wanna see the beam and the posts all fastened together using those same metal structural brackets in in the right fasteners, as well as I wanna see that post fastened into the footing.

[00:06:17] Eric Goranson: with some, you know, strong brackets. So that whole thing needs to be one big attached system, and that's okay, but you need to get that done. So if you had a company come in and they just did around the perimeter and they didn't do the rest of it, take some time and do the rest of that project correctly and get that fastened together.

[00:06:41] Eric Goranson: And that's gonna help you out. You know, for us here, I'm, I'm kind of looking at our, our Christmas coming up here this weekend, and I'm here in the Pacific Northwest in Portland, Oregon. We have an ice storm coming that's gonna be of epic proportion. So I'm now getting ready for ice storm weather because this afternoon here I'm gonna go out [00:07:00] and make sure that my gases together for the generator.

[00:07:03] Eric Goranson: There is a really good chance that we're gonna see high winds and at least a quarter inch of rain that's gonna come. When it's 20 in the low twenties outside. So with our big fur trees and wind, um, I think we're gonna see widespread damage here in our area this week. And, uh, that's gonna be Thursday, Friday in Christmas Eve.

[00:07:22] Eric Goranson: So there's a decent chance I could be running on generator for Christmas Eve, so I'm gonna make sure that I've got things dialed in. Unfortunately, I think it's gonna ruin our, our family, uh, Christmas Eve slash hanuk. Event that we have every Christmas Eve, but that's okay. We'll, we'll figure it out, but we're gonna make sure and get that all put together so we can, uh, you know, keep the house safe, which is important.

[00:07:45] Eric Goranson: So any you out there listening, just, you know, take the time. I'm gonna go out and make sure I've got fresh gas. I've got some here for the, for the generator from last season. I've been kind of rotating through. And that's one thing if you've got a generator, make sure you've always got fresh gas. And what I do with that [00:08:00] is if I've got my gas cans for the gas that I'm already ready to go.

[00:08:04] Eric Goranson: every probably 90 days, I take it and pop that into my truck, and then I go fill that up again because I want the freshest gas for that generator in my truck. If I put five gallons in, in, in 30 gallons and who cares, right? It's, it's, even though if it's a little old, it's gonna be at 90 days it's gonna be fine.

[00:08:23] Eric Goranson: It's when it starts getting a year or two and you haven't put any of the, uh, treatment into it that you can have some serious issues and you want that thing. Perfectly. It also reduces emissions if it's running correctly. So you're gonna have less of that smell and that exhaust smell around the house, cuz I dunno about you, but in my neighborhood here, when we get the, uh, power outage like that, it just smells like somebody's running the old lawnmower outside from everybody's generators running, cuz the, uh, air out there's pretty bad.

[00:08:49] Eric Goranson: So it's one of those things to. now. Just make sure everybody out there that, uh, you follow up on those earthquake stuff. If you're in an earthquake area, make sure that you've got that taken care of. [00:09:00] All right, everybody. Well, we've got a, a super fun show ahead this weekend. And so what I decided to do, so I'll give you guys since you're listening to this, a sneak peek of kind of what we have going on here.

[00:09:10] Eric Goranson: I didn't wanna do a whole brand new show that, that, you know, Christmas Eve and, and New Year's Eve are not like the. The huge days of home improvement, but I wanted to get some in interesting stuff out there without having a guest, you know, lose a little bit of the audience out there. So what I did is here, coming up this weekend is part one of my favorite episode nuggets from 2022, where I went back and found great episodes and segments from those episodes that are great, that have jam-packed information.

[00:09:44] Eric Goranson: So, looking here, This Saturday show, we're gonna start out with some smart home basics. Then we're gonna dive back into, um, master Electrician Dustin Seltzer from Electrician U. Then we're gonna talk, uh, with Steve over there from UL Fire Safety Research. We're gonna talk about [00:10:00] some fire safety, and then we're gonna talk with, uh, Dom again from Evolv Stone.

[00:10:05] Eric Goranson: That's gonna be fun talking about that. If you know, not seen Evolved Stone, what those guys do is they, uh, actually take this composite product that looks like brand. Stone, the stack stone that you installed, but you do it with a finish nailer. Then we're gonna dive into one of my favorite fun episodes that had nothing to do with home improvement, really unlimited hydroplane racing, was strong racing.

[00:10:25] Eric Goranson: We're gonna talk to them for a little bit and then, uh, some emergency preparedness for your family and, uh, Ross from this old house. And then of course, true crime meets home improvement. We're gonna talk a little bit with Sarah Listy from Murder House and, uh, murder House Flip where she went in and helped people with, uh, serial killer.

[00:10:44] Eric Goranson: That had, uh, murdered people and she went in and cleaned up the house from a bad flip and helped make that right. So we've got a jam packed show this weekend of stuff that you probably missed, cuz you know, most people don't listen to every single episode. So I want, you knows, to the [00:11:00] end of the year, let's grab that stuff and put it together so we have some kind of a, uh, a fun deal.

[00:11:05] Eric Goranson: So everybody out there now that we're coming up on Christmas, I want everybody to have a happy Hanukah This. Merry Christmas this weekend. Enjoy it. Spend that time with the family. And if, uh, maybe if you're somebody out there that's struggling and uh, maybe the family's not working out, maybe your relationship's not working out.

[00:11:24] Eric Goranson: Reach out to somebody to give you a hand. You know, you're not alone out there. So I don't wanna see anybody doing this by themselves over the holidays. This is something to reach out to a friend. There's no shame in that and say, Hey, I need some. We'd much rather have you around, out there as one of our friends and family.

[00:11:40] Eric Goranson: So make sure that you, uh, take some time and let a cooler head prevail and enjoy the holidays because this can be enjoyable for everybody. All righty. Have a Merry Christmas. Happy Hanukkah. We'll see you next week. Thanks again for listening to Around the House.[00:12:00]