I am not in the know as to what the answer(s) could be, but a lot is mind set, and that can be a difficult thing to change, and it takes time (years). Twenty years ago in the coffee room of my office there was a discussion about pollution and gasoline consumption, and someone made the comment about how we are gluts (in North America) about stuff, and how some of the things we buy or pay for are too cheap, and should be WAY more expensive. He used saran wrap as an example, it's so cheap that people use it alot, and once, and throw it out, yet it doesn't decompose well (or at all?), and costs $ and resources to make. I walked away (young and naive) thinking he was one of those 'hippies' from the 60's, yet over time I found myself coming back to his comment and I've started to look at everything I use, and questioning whether I need to do things the way the tv commercials tell me to (and society). I try to watch my gas consumption, grouping my errands to the same part of town on the given day. And waiting another week or two until I am back in that part of the city, instead of making a special drive for an item. But it's how to get other people to start to be aware of this. They get hit with 'global warming' speeches on the news, and it's so depressing and overwhelming that I think many just try to avoid thinking about it, placing hope and trust in researchers, or that all will turn out well. I read in a People Magazine that last year Tom Cruise's fuel bill was $1,000,000. (Jetting his beloved over to Italy so she can pick out the perfect dress for one of his premieres - is that like my family driving 20K in to town to window shop?) Just because he's got the $, what gives him the right to use so much? I cannot remember, but in some eastern country, residents had gas card allowances, where it did not matter if you had the money to buy more, you could only purchase 30 litres of gas per week for personal use. Maybe that's what's needed here, a weekly limit, to try to make people aware of the gas they use, when they want to hop in the vehicle and drive in to town to 'shop' because they've nothing fun to do that day. Or there needs to be some way to know what the actual cost of driving here and there is, like the meter on a taxi. kioni

Oh boy, BM left them with no washer. SD 17 called today and said "I need to come over RIGHT NOW to do my laundry, I have no clean clothes". I was like "huh, I am not getting you, why don't you just wash them, I have seen you do laundry, what's up?" and she is like "the washer is broken" so I said "did it just happen, do you want me to call the landlord to ask him to fix it?" And she is like "no, he knows". BM and Skids rent a house and the landlord and his wife and child live next door, landlord and his wife bought the house next door to them and renovated it and BM and the kids have lived there for like it must be 4 years now. Skids used to babysit landlord's daughter, they had a good relationship with them, but I think BM has been late with the rent, also BM and Skids have regular "screaming matches" so the Skids no longer are asked to babysit the daughter of the landlord/neighbour. Skids and BM now call him a "jerk", which I don't think is warranted. DH and I think that she has been late on rent a lot, and she is a "difficult" person to begin with so she has probably yelled at him or been nasty in some way, more than likely. Anyways, so SD says "it's an old washer and he won't fix it." Istill need some "retraining" Sweeby, because my FIRST reaction is "we should just buy a new washer to help out the kids". My DH is like "WAAAHHHT??!! are you nuts??" I realized that was not the way to go, BM has made so much difficulty for us with Skids but I guess I just wonder, do I ask the landlord what's up and run interference nicely for the Skids' sakes? Do I ignore it, what do I do? leave it alone? I mean, SD17 can do laundry with us, but what about when BM gets back, then what does SD do? BM gets over $1300 a month in CS, plus she works full time, so I don't know why she doesn't just buy a new washer or get it repaired, it's weird...anyways, any suggestions are welcome, thanks!! :)

Because the gfci only trips when the old barn circuit is feeding it and not when the original circuit is feeding it, then you have a problem beyond a downstream neutral-to-ground short. I can't check your wiring from here and can only rely on what you've posted so far, yet you have not posted any voltage readings - causing me to believe that you are using the guess method to troubleshoot. You said you double & triple-checked the connections by seeing if the wire colors under the wirenuts matched up. This only eliminates conditions which would cause a breaker to trip, which is not your problem. You need to buy and learn to use a meter if you're going to do electrical work. The problem is in the wiring on the 2nd floor where you previously remodeled. This is what I'd look for if I were there: 1) in the box where you are attaching the old barn circuit, the original circuit branched in 2 or more directions. (Let's call this the branching box.) 2) you are not replacing the original circuit in the branching box, but rather are attempting to divide the outgoing cables between the 2 incoming circuits. 3) downstream of the gfci, 2 of the neutrals which left the branching box are tied together in the remodeled area. When you remodeled, you should have had one downstream box where the power coming in did not go back out on another cable. I'm betting that didn't happen, and you have a loop back to the branching box. 4) the 2 circuits are on different 120v legs, causing the gfci to see original neutral current which has reversed polarity from the barn neutral. It's also possible that the hots are tied together downstream at the point where the neutrals are tied. In that case I would have expected you to already have lit yourself up, yet that hasn't happened. So maybe you daisy-chained the hots through the receptacles rather than pigtailing and have re-used an old receptacle with a broken tab between the hots. Or maybe you have been turning off both breakers when you worked on the circuit, and the tripped gfci has kept the breakers from seeing a 240v dead short. These are just guesses based on the symptoms and results you describe, and perhaps they're all wrong. But they are what I would look for first if I were there. Best bet: call in a professional electrician. Your inability to find and fix this gfci problem casts major doubts on the safety of the pool wiring you're planning out of your new barn panel...

Last update? I'm having to take on additional responsibilities at work in this fiscal year and will have less time for posts. ("up or out" LOL) Happened to be over there yesterday, and although mostly losing my sweet tooth, decided I could not resist some ice cream at the Creamery. The Emmenopterys is dead. The Osmanthus X fortunei, though, was full of fragrant flowers and in great shape. I don't know why they are bothering with this Trachy...another polar vortex winter will take it out. Especially because they didn't give one of the most sheltered spots. The moment I saw this, I thought, "omg, is that what I think it is?" And, it is. I would never steal anything...and I certainly wouldn't be updating this thread if I were planning to do so! But this is the rarest plant in this garden...rarer than the Emmenopterys in my opinion, and I'm a little surprised they didn't plant it in a more hidden spot for it to size up. Ladies and gentlemen, the elusive Torreya jackii.Looks grown from seed to me...thinking the needles will get longer. Debated about featuring but already established that there are rare plants in this garden last year, and in other threads over the years. I think plant collectors are mostly an honest lot? Hope so...if it does well in this garden, cutting material will be available in a few years. The wet summer has allowed their Camellia yuhsienensis to size up and finally look really happy. This plant has been struggling for years but more from neglect I think. It is very hardy and was in full bloom only a couple weeks after the polar vortex freezes ended...way before even 'Korean Fire'. I want one eventually, but am happy enough to have a hybrid of it, 'Dream Angel', that has similarly tough ability to bloom in a real mid-atlantic winter. This is the base of their Quercus virginiana...and sorry to say, looks like 2013-2015 and January 2018 have finished this guy off. Top looks very sparse. I guess they are giving it one more year in case a miracle happens LOL. (spoiler alert...they don't) I've decided I like the look of the variegated Illicium - kinda like a poor man's version of the variegated Daphniphyllum, which is very difficult to graft and may just be too weak to survive in most of the mid-Atlantic. Didn't wade in for a closer pic because I bet this place is teaming with Ixodes. I wonder why this Magnolia macrophylla looks sickly. Chlorosis? They have several but this one is the worst looking. Saw them back in the summer...had never actually been around that species in bloom. The floral odor is indeed disagreeable. Not a good picture but a nice combination of 2 Cephalotaxus and Thujopsis. Finally, nice to see Acer griseum but too bad they let the trunk do this.