Turning a Pig's Ear into a Silk Purse

I'll admit that I was disappointed when R told me he could not relocate that electrical conduit under the window because of the less than 10 inches of crawl space height under that wing of the house. We discussed it for several days and R was adamant that if he just cleaned up the conduit and straightened it that it would look good once it was painted.  I wasn't so sure.

I felt that it was still out of place even if it was fixed up.  I thought that people would wonder "why didn't they hide that inside the wall?"  So we just left it and moved on to something else.  That was until I was raking on the south side of the house and noticed the exterior outlet.   Ding ding ding!! This would be a perfect solution to our problem.  Not only would it take care of the problem of why would someone run conduit on the outside of the house BUT it would give us an electrical outlet to use if we need electricity to run holiday lights.

I was pretty sure that we could do this IF there was enough wire.  R is always a glass 1/2 empty kind of guy.  He was sure there would not be enough wire but being the nice guy he is, he would try. Good thing because I had already bought the exterior box with weathertite cover, a duplex outlet, and 3 conduit clamps.  He's a 'glass half empty' guy and I'm a 'already bought it and can't find the receipt to take it back' kind of a gal.  Don't judge me.  If I can lie to the utility company about a leaky gas meter, I easily say I lost a receipt.  I'll say an extra Hail Mary.

R pulled the main disconnect and I mowed the back yard.  Next thing I know, R is waving me in for a pit stop.  Verdict is that there will be enough wire if he back stabbed the wire.  It's not ideal but you have to do, what you have to do, to make things work when you have an old house.  Then R informed me that the wire gauge was too big to back stab.  Grrrrrrr

I went back to mowing and R left to try and find the right duplex outlet.  We have a large lot so I mowed and mowed all the while stewing about that ugly conduit on the front of the house when I looked up and saw R waving me in for another pit stop.  He said he had finally found one that would work and it was installed already.

Say what?

Sure enough it was all installed and it worked!!!  He purchased the industrial grade outlet where you can back stab the wire but there is a clamp to hold it in place and it also accomadates the larger gauge wire.

Before I painted the shingles I scraped off the old paint off the conduit so the paint finish would not be all bumpy from the million drips that add accumulated over the last who knows how many years.

Voila.....now it blends and looks like it has a purpose.