Saturday, March 8, 2014

Up on the Roof, and Underneath the House

Let's play catch up, shall we?

To begin with, I am very excited about some gerbera daisy plants that I placed in rehab on the side of the house last November or so. By golly, they've done their job, and are flowering once again!
Count this blogger as happy!

That title is somewhat intriguing right? That was last Saturday's fun, had not by me, but by Bruce and Bill. The roof is some material I can't remember the name of, but it is white, and it WAS covered with a nasty green mold. Mr. Bill got up there and went to scrubbing with soapy bleach water.
As it was a momentous occasion, I did my part as the renovation photographer to document his first time on the roof, make that any roof! The funny thing is that when the twins were younger it was
David who was the king of workers, Bill was too busy playing guitar. Now Bill is the one most interested in house related things. That is pretty true though for their entire lives, one would like something at one time, then the tables would turn, and the other one got into it.

This is a silly photograph of me taken in the mirror leaning against the wall upstairs. I wanted to show the blooming pink tabebuia tree reflected, however what's most funny about it is me--squinting away at the camera!
While on the balcony I took this shot of the view:
Remember when the dumpster first arrived? Well, believe me, after Saturday it is close to needing an emptying. The lawn, such as it is, was covered, and I do mean covered, with fallen oak leaves which yours truly removed with the blower. I'm not sure how long it took, at least until I ran out of gas, but for the most part the leaves are now a thing of the past. As well, I had my first taste of using a crow bar! Exciting stuff, right? Never once in my 60 years had I used a crow bar before, but if you want to be part of a team taking down 32 feet of worn-out fence, you've got to be flexible. I did not, on the other hand, carry the 4x4 posts to the dumpster--a task better left to Mr. Bruce.

This all happened after what was arguably one of the most nerve wracking experiences in the project to date. Bill wanted the cable to run to one of the living room walls, a wall shared by the adjacent office. Simple enough, or so you might think while reading this. NOT! Mr. Bruce to the rescue once again! You may recall that this house has a crawl space, and they mean that literally, one has to crawl underneath the foundation to move stuff around. Herbert, God bless him, had already experienced this while moving the plumbing. He did not, however, actually crawl half the distance of the house as Bruce did on Saturday. Bill crouched by the wall communicating with his Dad by shouting at the wall as Bruce crawled with the cable. Maybe you had to be there? Here's Bill under the kitchen trying to grab the cable wire..
The picture also shows all the new electrical wire Herbert is running, the yellow stuff, to make the new kitchen a reality. To say Bill was a nervous wreck with his Dad under the house is putting it mildly. But, as I knew he would, out he comes from the tiny hole used to access the space with his head lantern in place.
Finally, on Thursday evening the cable guy came, and after weeks and weeks, Bill finally has cable, and more importantly, the internet!

We did not spend every day over there, although, you would think so, wouldn't you? One day we had to go to the office to have the folks there work on Bruce's computer. In a bad move, someone forgot to tell the IT folks that he was staying for an additional two weeks, which led to his badge, phone and computer being shut off. While he was inside, I thought I might play with my camera a bit. I'm sort of obsessed with the bare trees right now.
I'd brought along my camera manual, such as it is, to learn more about how the camera works. I say that about the manual because these days, most of it you have to access through a disc. While fiddling around, I saw the flashing light indicating the battery was on it's last legs. Bummer! Happily I had enough charge left to document what came next---an alligator climbed out of the pond while I was watching!!!!
Yup, the gator just lay there taking advantage of the sunny day. You don't see this sight every day, now do you?

Well, it is time to get dressed to head out for another day of construction work; painting is my specialty, as is the pool, which is driving me to distraction trying to make it presentable!

Happy weekend friends!

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