Horn Hack

This post is a little behind, but it is interesting.
When I got my new job, I drove the Golf for a couple days due to my longer commute, so Chrissy had to drive the Miata to work.  Someone tried to run over her so she attempted to use the horn, only to discover it didn't work.  Shockingly, the horn did work when I bought the car, so I looked into several possible causes, but thought it might be related to my recent passenger airbag removal.  I reattached half of the airbag connector under the dash and the horn was back in action.  Great success!

Toilet Tampering

Before

We started having trouble with the toilet in our master bath, again.  There seemed to be a slow leak, so it was constantly running.  I didn't see any water draining into the bowl, but that had to be the problem.  It turned out the zip-tie that holds in the fancy dual-flush unit broke (just like it did in the guest bath) and was caught in the gasket, causing a slow leak.

After removing the broken zip-tie and replacing it with a sturdier one, I adjusted the float level and thought I was good.  I wanted to get the water level a bit lower, but the float type wouldn't allow it, which bugged me, but I was happy to have the leak fixed.  I left the lid off so I could monitor everything for a while.  A day later, I discovered the water level was very slowly rising and running into the overflow pipe.  Who knows how much water was wasted.

I happened to have a spare valve on hand because I unnecessarily replaced it in the other bathroom.  Long story, that I won't go into.  Oddly, I can't find a blog post about it.

The first step was draining the tank and removing the old valve.  I recommend having plenty of old towels on-hand.

Once that was done, installing the replacement valve was a cinch.  So far there's no leaks and I was able to dial in the exact water level I wanted.  Success.

After

Fun Frame

Before

Let me start by saying I hate people who drive slowly in the fast lane.  I, however, drive with the flow of traffic, but I often leave a bigger gap in front of me than most.  I do this because I'm a better driver than most.  That reasonable gap, combined with the fact that I'm driving a Prius seems to make the driver behind me extra stupid.  I wanted a way to gently remind people to back off and calm down.  I didn't want to mar the Prius with a bumper sticker, so I started looking for a license plate frame to convey the appropriate message.
Most readily available frames were a little more aggressive than I wanted, with phrases like "The closer you get, the slower I drive" (I don't need any road rage), so I ordered a custom frame from ebay.  I actually got two for $10.  It's a little more in-your-face than I expected due to the text font/size, but I like it.

After

Crumbling Clothes Line

As you can see above, our clothesline uses plastic pieces to hold a couple metal pieces in place.  On the opposite side of the mechanism, the plastic piece broke and disappeared.

I wanted to replace the plastic piece with metal, but it was proving to be too tight, so I drilled a new hole.

I then added a stainless steel bolt to hold support the existing piece.  Good as new.

About Time for Aeration

The faucets in our guest bathroom had pretty unobstructed flow since we bought the house and we never bothered to change them, until now.  We previously did the master bathroom faucets, but with the drought raging on, it was definitely time to update the guest bath.  We were able to buy just the aerator inserts and reuse the chrome rings.
For just a couple bucks we were able to reduce our water usage with pretty much no impact on our lives.

Caged Cats

Before

We have a problem with the neighborhood cats using our back yard as their own personal litter box.  It seems like every time I walk on the lawn, I step in cat shit.  Something had to be done.
The back corner of our yard is their favorite spot to enter and exit.  You can see how they've eroded the top fence board in the photo above.

Before

We looked into various repellents, but none seem that great.  Fortunately, Chrissy discovered that cats apparently hate walking on chicken wire, so we decided to coat the top of the fence in it.

After

Right in the corner, we folded the wire to be several layers thick.

After

We also caged in the corner area so they couldn't jump up there.  Hopefully this will deter them from coming through our yard in the future.

After

Trashy Chair

Before

When we moved into our first apartment, my brother gave us a couple folding chairs as a housewarming present.  One of them is in perfect condition, but the one you see above has deteriorated a bit.
A bit of duct tape made it better than new.

After