This past week was a productive one. Andy filled the back of the truck with wood to give it more traction in the snow when he plows:
The well driller installed the new lid for our well house (now being painted):
And Joe managed to get all of the permits we need for the septic system, house, and shed and dug the trenches for the house foundation:
The plan for this week was for Joe to put the rebar in and get approval from the building inspector to pour the concrete so we could order the shed. Unfortunately we had a bit of snow this weekend and there’s a winter storm watch for tonight, so who knows?
For more, and higher quality, pictures start here.
Busy Week
Posted in Change, Living Fully
11 Comments
Still Waiting
This view of the clearing was taken last Thursday. That was the day Joe was supposed to go down to Bernalillo to get the building permits, so between that and the weather we weren’t surprised that Andy was the only one up there. But Friday was beautiful and still no one else came up.
The weekend was gorgeous and the same is predicted for the first part of the coming week. So Andy is going to phone Steve tomorrow morning to see if (1) we now have the permits, and (2) if they will take advantage of the good weather to get something done on the construction. I will let you know!
In the meantime Andy is cutting down more trees and we’ve been making decisions on the roofing, windows, exterior colors, etc. so some progress is being made.
Posted in Change, Taking Risks
7 Comments
Working and Waiting
For larger view click on picture.
For larger view click on picture.
They continued preparing the site for the shed Friday while Steve and Joe (supposedly) went down to Bernalillo to see if they could get some building permits. We haven’t heard if they had any luck but should know more tomorrow.
We’re still keeping an eye on the weather. There’s a 50% chance of precipitation Wednesday, which might slow things down. Especially if it’s time to start pouring concrete. It’s all very interesting. 🙂
Posted in Change
7 Comments
Unexpected Aftermath
Last Thursday and Friday the road to and from the mountains was closed by semi trucks that rolled over. A company from Colorado was hauling away cars destroyed by the Las Conchas fire last summer, and apparently some of the drivers weren’t used to hairpin turns. Out of four truckloads two made it, two did not. (Both drivers are fine.)
We weren’t affected by the 5+ hour closure Thursday because we went to Santa Fe. But Friday Andy was stopped shortly after the accident occurred. He waited about an hour, and when it was obvious he wouldn’t be allowed through for several more hours he decided to drive home the long way…a three-hour trip. It was raining but he decided if he had to do it over he would simply have parked the car and walked the 5-6 miles home. Not the least because he triggered the 7-pm rule. If he isn’t home by 7 pm and hasn’t called I’m supposed to organize a search party.
He had tried to phone but his cell-phone battery was dead. So when he arrived at about 7:30 I was on the porch waiting for Beate and Tim to pick me up to go up and start looking for him. (They’re our closest summertime neighbors up there. They’re still here because they took a sabbatical to replant and rebuild.)
Their new cabin, taken from our property.
Beate in their kitchen/living room.
Needless to say I wish they lived here full time. Some of the sweetest words I’ve ever heard was when Beate said, “It will take us 15 minutes to get there, but wait on the porch. We’re coming to pick you up.”
Have you ever had neighbors like that?
Posted in Change, Lifelong Learning
10 Comments
Continuing Education
As I’ve mentioned before, Google and the internet has been invaluable the past few months. First to get information for documenting the value of our losses for insurance, more recently for getting information about materials for the new structure.
Now I’m done with that for a while and am curious about how effective the overhangs Steve (our architect/project coordinator) is proposing will be. Our first house was designed for passive solar, so we spent a lot of time looking at sun position and calculating how much sun would come in the windows in summer and winter. When I mentioned to Andy that I was going to try to do the same for the new design, he pointed out our solar book was one of the casualties of the fire. No problem, I said, I’ll bet I can find something on the internet.
Sure enough, a website called SunEarthTools.com not only has the formulas I need to calculate the sun position as a function of time for our latitude and longitude, it also does some of the calculations for me. I’ll still have to review some basic trigonometry when I take the overhangs into account, but the site will save me a lot of time. I do love the internet!
What about you?
Posted in Lifelong Learning
8 Comments
Tempting Fate?
Andy has been going up every day and cutting down some of the trees blocking the view. He hasn’t taken any new pictures and says I’ll notice the change when I go up. (I’m waiting for the trash container company to take away the last four containers so we can make our final decision about where to place the house.)
Thursday morning we talked to the fellow who will probably install our solar cells, if we can afford him. He was very knowledgeable so we’re keeping our fingers crossed. But talking about the grounding system brought up the subject of lightning protection. We only had two instances of damage in the past. In both cases the lightning struck a tree and in one case it fried some of our electrical wires and our generator. In the other case it split a tree and bounced over to the support for one of our beams and knocked off a piece of concrete. We were glad in both cases we weren’t there when it happened.
Now, of course, there are no trees to be struck. The house will be the tallest thing around. Do you think we’re tempting fate? When we decided to rebuild we joked that maybe the gods were trying to tell us something by wiping everything out. If that was true what would be the next message? A big bolt of lightning? It might not be such a joke. 😀
Thanks to Evan, bikehikebabe, Mike, Rummuser, tammy, Cathy and Stephan for commenting on last week’s post.
Posted in Humor, Taking Risks
15 Comments
Doing the Best We Can With What We Have Left
Before:
East end of the house.
View from the east deck.
View towards the east end of the clearing.
After:
View from the edge of the clearing looking east.
View from the edge of the clearing looking south of east.
It’s certainly not as pretty without the trees, but cutting down the biggest ones has given the clearing a feeling of space. It’s not without its charm. It’s the best we can do with what we have left, and it will be interesting to see how the view changes in the next few years.
Has life handed you any lemons lately? How do you like lemonade?
Posted in Living Fully
17 Comments
An Unexpected Development
The burned area is still closed to the general public because of the danger from flash flooding, falling rocks and trees, etc., but landowners have access as long as they have their key and signed paperwork with them. So Andy has to escort the contractor and workmen in and out every time they go up. (Yes, that is a nuisance!)
One morning a couple of weeks ago getting in took even longer than usual. The place was swarming with law enforcement officials, part of an interagency task force that included the National Park Service, the Drug Enforcement Agency, a New Mexico State Police SWAT team, the New Mexico National Guard, the Santa Fe National Forest, the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office, the Los Alamos Police and Fire Departments, and a Special Events and Tactic Team made up of park personnel from eight different states. So it wasn’t just a matter of opening the gate and going in, Andy had to show his paperwork and everyone had to show their identification.
Why? Because when a helicopter was flying over Bandelier National Monument to check for the effects of flash flooding, the the pilot saw a blue tarp on one of the rugged slopes. The people who went in to investigate found a sophisticated marijuana farm containing about 9000 plants with a street value estimated to be about $9 million. As far as I can tell they didn’t catch the people involved in spite of all their efforts. They did dismantle the farm and will be on the lookout for more drug growing in the future.
Again, who says life in the sticks is dull? 😀
Are there any interesting stories from your neck of the woods?
Posted in Lifelong Learning, Living Fully
37 Comments
Busy Week
We made a reasonable amount of progress this week, and with any luck the site will be cleared by next Thursday or Friday.
The well driller fished the pump out from the bottom of the well…
and tested to show that it still worked.
That was good news. Now he’s calculating how much it will cost to replace all the contents of the well house and to repair the rest of the water system.
Saturday we went to Santa Fe to order Andy’s new truck. It’s supposed to take 6-10 weeks to get here… hopefully it will be here in time for us to mount a snow plow before winter. So things are moving along. A lot more needs to be done, and I’ll keep you posted.
Posted in Living Fully
12 Comments
Road Work
What a difference a few days make. The above picture was taken yesterday, Saturday, August 27 at approximately the same place on our driveway as the following two, taken Wednesday, August 24:
When we left for home yesterday afternoon the spot looked like this:
There’s no guarantee it didn’t rain last night, so who knows what it will look like when Andy goes up today. I will let you know. Keep your fingers crossed for us!
Posted in Living Fully
20 Comments
