The Garage – Episode Two
Day Four
When I return from town, another load of screenings has arrived. The footing forms have been dismantled and the footings tidied up. The expansion material has been placed between the inside edge of the footings and the screenings (which are being tamped down yet again).
Day Five
It’s the weekend. The owner of the excavator shows up to haul it away for a job on Monday. He kids the Mr. about how hard he’s been working (the crew has apparently filled him in).
Day Six
The Mr. spends some time this morning filling big clean garbage cans with water for the pour tomorrow. We’ll need water (and 2 litre squirt bottles) for the paddling machine when the floor is smoothed out (as we don’t have a hose). The humidity is rising and we think we deserve a couple of hours at the beach.
Day Seven
Huge light show in the wee hours when a storm blew in. When your windows are 7 feet tall you really get the full effect of non-stop lightening. I worried that the power would go out but instead we have no telephone. 10 am – the telephone is now working but the crew has not arrived…
Change of plan – they’re going to lay block today – just one course – and install the threaded rods the Mr. will use for bolting the wall frames onto.
Day Eight
Crew arrives mid-afternoon for a late pour when it’s shady and cooler. There is poly to put down on the screenings first. Fibreglass is mixed into the concrete for strength, rather than laying rebar/mesh. More wheelbarrow and shovel work.
8 pm and the “helicopter” is still paddling the floor. Lots of waiting in between paddling. We manage to have a BBQ and everybody grabs a burger and cold drink.
The floor looks great and I’ll have somewhere to practise t’ai chi once it sets up. I suppose I’ll be dodging basking snakes once they discover it…
It’s 10 pm before we’re sauna-ed and parked in front of the TV news with a cold drink.
Day Nine
I am awakened by the sound of splashing. The Mr. is sluicing down the floor with buckets of water to keep the cement from curing too quickly – we want to avoid “flash cracking”. (Oh yeah, we’re learning the lingo.) He will do this every hour all day unless it rains. The crew arrives bright and early (despite yesterday’s long work day) to score the floor – the theory being that if it does crack it will crack along the score lines. (Note the super soaker being used to keep water on the cut line. These guys have been great about working around our “primitive” conditions.)
and the PowWOW - man, would love to have seen that for real - woulda needed to photograph every feather.
) - don't like the sound of the bite despite my love of bugs - <shudders at the thought of the spiders there> but glad all was OK in the end. What medical services do you have around there if needed????? What would you do in an emergency? How's yer toots doing?
Thanks, JPB, I like this photo too.
