Cousins Construction Recap

I know, I know,   It’s been a long, long time but I have been very busy and, unlike my younger cousins, I cannot work 10 and 12-hour days.

 

That was Gatorade they were drinking.

You’ve probably forgotten, but my cousins came from Wyoming and Montana to replace three sets of exterior stairs.    If you haven’t forgotten, then you’re probably wondering if they managed to accomplish that or if I have to use a ladder to get onto my decks.

They started with this one that collapsed from rotting wood and heavy snow load.

This one would be next.  Rotten treads and cracked stringers.

 

Have no fear; the cousins are here.   

 

Bud is five months younger than me and I’m 82.   His brother Bob is five years  younger.   Just a whippersnapper so he got to handle the enormous circular saw that my neighbor brought over for the project.   Besides that, he’s a journeyman carpenter.   His second career.

 

Bud is a jack of all trades and master of several.   Until he retired and sold his business, he dealt primarily in heating and cooling and sheet metal.   He’s remodeled his own place and worked on others.   Right now he has a huge garage/shop project going as well as helping his daughter add-on and remodel her new house.

 

Anyway, back to the stair story.

 

The first item on the list of lumber I bought should tell you everything, but I’ll tell you anyway because that’s what I do—I tell stories.

 

First item:   12 ea. 4x12x12.   

 

In lumber-ese, that means I bought 12 pieces of lumber and they were 4 inches by 12 inches by 12 feet.  That’s all the material it took to replace the two sets of rotten stairs to my decks.   

 

Oh, and a bunch of “L” brackets and a bushel of screws.

The green marked lumber is for my two sets od deck stairs.

The red treated lumber is for exterior stairs to the second floor of another building on my property where my friend Julie lives.

 

We no sooner arrived at my place after I picked them up at the airport in Anchorage than Bob wandered outside without saying anything.   Bud and I were talking and noticed that Bob was missing.

 

Right then we heard a crash and found Bob well into demolishing the first set of stairs.  The heavy snow load this past winter caused the rotting stringers to break lengthwise and down went most of the steps.

 

Bud got into the act and soon the area was littered with rotting wood.

 

 

And that was that for the first night.   A couple hours and the site was ready for the next step.

When It Rains, Gullible Takes a Break

The weather has been delightful the last week and a half and I got a lot of chores done during that time.   

There are a lot of "I"s in this story, but I'm the only one who did all this, so there you have it.   This is my first day off from outdoor chores in a long time and I'm too brain-weary to change verbiage.

So, among the chores:

I pressure-washed and applied a penetrating oil to the 167 lineal feet of cable rail guardrail around my decks, and then applied a semi-transparent stain to those decks.   The pressure-washing along consumed five days of my "work days" because hanging onto the wand of a  hose blowing 3200 psi is quite a job for me and I could only stand three to four  hours of it at a time.

The photo above shows the washed rails and oil applied to the right side.

This shows the cleaned, oiled rails planks protecting the surface until it dries.

Washing the side deckwalk.

Before I began

Standing on the top rail with one foot on the ladder gave me the right angle to pressure-wash the top board.

Rails oiled and the bird deck stained.

A nice place to sit in the shade with a glass of lemonade and a camera.

I cut brush that was encroaching on my house, lawns, and driveway.  

 I started bucking up some logs I scavenged for firewood.   Still have to get back to that.

I applied stain to a second story staircase on another building on my property.   

On the roof of my own house, I stained some facia.   To keep from sliding off the roof,  I sat on one haunch on the asphalt shingles with the other foot below me and then leaned over the edge of the roof to stain the facia.

I took the below photo with my iPhone and since I can't keep from shaking, this turned into a mini-video.

While I was up on the roof, I also stained the facia along this upper deck.   That was easy, except for hauling the ladder up there.

I chickened out on doing this facia (below).   The roof is far too steep for me to be leaning over the edge.   The little pebbles one the roofing are like ball bearings.    Had I not been sitting while I did the far less steep pitch, I probably would have fallen.

This job will take scaffolding.

I cut as many limbs off the spruce next to the woodshed as I could reach.

One of many favorite tools, chain saw with a four-inch bar.   Stihl calls it a garden pruner, but because I don't have a garden, I put it to real work.

Just a small bit of the brush I've cut.   I have two utility trailer loads and more on the ground.

I got up on the metal roof of the woodshed and cut spruce limbs that overhang the shed and prevented snow from sliding off in winter.   Down the ladder I went and back up with my new toy--a battery powered leaf blower--and removed the piles of dead needles and other leaves and twigs on the roof.

Some of the limbs I cut. More are soon the other side of the shed.

Lots of debris on the roof.

The battery-powered leaf blower.   I love it.

All the debris is off but I need to get up there and wash it with the pressure washer.

Down the ladder I went to get a battery-powered screwdriver and the bit that holds roofing screws.   Up the ladder to replace and tighten some screws.

Down the ladder to get a stiff brush and a garden hose.   Up the ladder  to hose and brush off the remaining debris.   I decided that was too much work and I would need to haul the pressure washer up here to finish the cleaning job.   Some day.  The roofing does look solid, though.

And then the fun started.

The hose knocked over the ladder and I was stuck on the roof.   My cell phone was in the basket of the four-wheeler.   Julie wasn't home and my neighbors are too far away to hear me yelling.

I'd cut away too many branches from the spruce trees to be able to climb down them, so I looked to the far upper corner where a willow was growing.   As it turned out, I'd cut enough dead branches off of it that I could manage top ease my way down to the top rail of the 6' high fencing that was adjacent to the shed.

The lay-about ladder.

The willow, the wall, the fencing.

I thought for a while that if I could get to the far branches of the willow (left in photo), I could use them to rappel/swing down to the ground.   Getting onto the rail and moving along it was not easy, believe me.

Once I reached that position, however, I saw a dead limb that I'd cut and it was right in my proposed landing spot.    Dead limbs don't give.   They puncture.   I gave up on that idea and moved farther along the rail to where the spruce boughs were piled.

SO, this is what I did.   I eased myself to a sitting position on the top rail of the fence.   This wasn't too tricky because I had the shed to lean against.   Then, thinking I could hold on to the rail, spin around and land in the spruce boughs.

Spruce boughs are soft, they tell us.   I've read dozens of articles about people cutting them to spread out  their sleeping bags and such.

DON'T LET ANYONE TELL YOU SPRUCE BOUGHS ARE SOFT!!!    

They aren't.   I plummeted to the ground.   I wasn't hurt.   I laid there in the scented boughs and thought about all this, laughing about getting myself into this situation, and thankful I wasn't hurt.    I had a lot more to do before the rainy days started.

I woke up the next morning with a very sore left shoulder, but it wasn't from falling onto the spruce boughs.   My left shoulder has been compromised for decades, so long that I can't remember exactly how I injured it.  

I can't raise my arm above shoulder high.   I always get patted down at airport security because I cannot assume the position in the X-RAY  thing.

I had two smoke alarms beeping at me, so I hauled the 8' ladder up to the loft floor.   Have you ever tried to change the battery in a smoke alarm using only one hand?    It can't be done.   In the loft, however, I was able to climb high enough that my left hand could somewhat hold the alarm while I inserted the battery.

In the garage, it was a different matter.   This alarm had a design that required unplugging the wiring harness, inserting the battery by attaching it to positive and negative sockets, replacing the wiring harness, and then replacing the alarm on the bracket.   Not gonna happen with one hand.   So, I forced my arm up.   Forced it beyond its limitations.  

And that's why my shoulder is sore.   Not from all the exertions of the last ten days.   Not from all the ladders and equipment I've been hauling around.   Not from falling onto the spruce boughs.   It's sore from replacing two smoke alarm batteries!!!

Nonetheless, the next day was supposed to be the last of the nice weather and the chores continued.

I mowed all the six lawns twice over this period.   The roots from quaking aspens were sending up shoot that threatened to take over one lawn.

I carried the ladder over to the lawn shed on the right with the big windows.   From the roof I was able to cut a lot of spruce branches away from the roof, then blow the debris off with the leaf blower.

Cutting down the vegetation on the leach field of my sewer system was another chore that really needed doing.      If I didn't, the saplings and fireweed growing on it would seek the water that drains from the elevated perforated pipes, eventually penetrating growing inside the pipes and clogging them.  Very essential chore.

I started my brush cutter with the metal blade but it died and refused to start again, so I did what I could with a string trimmer.   Those 3/8" thick fireweed stalks were too much. 

I put the metal-bladed, gas-powered brush cutter in time-out, and (surprisingly) drove the John Deere lawn mower up a gravel/dirt ramp and cut down some more vegetation.

The brush cutter in time out.

That night, I thought about the metal bladed brush cutter and it being in time out.   Had I acted hastily?   Was the punishment unjust?

The next day, I  verified what my late-night thoughts suggested.   I had neglected the proper care and feeding of Things Gas-Powered.   Once I filled its tank with gas, it started with a mighty roar and joyfully cut down the vegetation on the tricky parts the lawn mower couldn't do.  I still have to cut away a lot of brush growing in from the sides, though.   That's chain saw operation right there.

While all this was going on, I sanded a slice of cotton wood that I'd found and dragged home a couple years ago.  It was so heavy that I had a lot of trouble lifting it onto the back of my truck.    Now, it's very light.

I wanted the chain saw marks to be visible, but I also wanted to be able to wipe away any bird poop.   While it isn't sanded smooth, it's good enough after two coats of Varathane.

Some day I'll do something with the stump the cottonwood is laid on.

Speaking of sitting, I don't care to sit in bird droppings.   The birds like to perch on the chairs and poop.

After I cleaned the deck chairs for the third time this summer, I decided a way to poop-proof the poop perches and draped them with a tent fly that I'd found.

Poop-proofing the poop perch.

Like this, but on the deck.,

The next day I decided that was too much trouble and just turned the chairs over.   They can poop on the bottoms of the chairs.

The wild red currents are ripe, but now it's raining and I will get soaked if I go out to pick them.   Maybe I'll let the birds have them this year.

Now, it's raining.   The forecast is for something like forty days and forty nights of rain, or whatever.   It's rained almost 0.6 inches just today.

I haven't done anything but feed myself, go to the post office, and put this post together.   Tonight, maybe I'll watch some TV.   Maybe old episodes of Supernanny, or something.

And feel sorry for this drenched Steller's Jay.

 

A Week in the Life...

That warm and glorious spring weather that tanned my face and arms from elbow to wrist came to a tempestuous halt Monday when a snarling storm thrashed its way out of the Bering Sea, up the Aleutian Chain, and right into the valley where Dave and I were starting the railings around my decks.

No more warm sunny days.  The guard rails and hand rails mandated by my insurance company had to be built this spring without fail or my homeowner's insurance would be canceled.  Again.  Well, maybe "again" is not the proper term.  State Farm refused to renew my insurance (after many, many years) last December and I was forced to find another insurer.  That second company granted insurance on the condition the rails went up this spring.

I didn't want rails in the first place, but as this house is my old age pension, I acceded.

The first 4x6 post goes up.

The worst part about that storm was the wind that propelled it.  The spitting rain we could work in, but that wind had me dressed up like the temperature was below zero.

I was, as they say, on the dumb end of the board, and thus not moving around much.  Dave was able to stay relatively warm in the 46 degree temps, though each day he came to work he dressed slightly warmer than the day before, progressing from a cotton shirt to flannel to fleece.  Forty-six degrees is a pleasant day around here, but not with winds strong enough to blow boards and tools off the deck.

Thursday, between the rain and wind and lost power, we quit in the early afternoon.  The storm had knocked out the electricity sometime during Wednesday night, and we used generator power for a few hours, until the rain started falling in earnest.

That night about 11 PM, I looked outside and saw clear blue sky.  Maybe this was the end of the storm.

Friday morning was windy and rainy.  The storm has simply regrouped, and if anything, the day was colder.  By late morning, conditions seemed to be improving and Dave showed up in a fleece shirt.  I was dressed for minus twenty.

We worked until 5 PM, putting on the cap rails.  At 6:30, I couldn't stand it any longer.  I drove twenty miles from home and cleaned up another mile of highway litter.  The storm had lessened by then and at one point I almost took off my jacket.  I have now reached the Hope cut-off.

Driving back home at 9 PM, the sinking sun lit the mountains through the separating clouds.

As I climbed the steps to the deck, I noticed the mountain to the south of me had shed more of its winter burden of snow.

Assuming the world doesn't end this weekend, we will be well on the way to placating a certain insurance company.

I'm hoping Mother Nature shed her final winter burden with that last storm and she settles down to enjoy the summer.  Maybe I can finally put away my winter clothing, too.





Total litter bags filled to date:  210

Saved by Incompetence

When today arrived and seemed to promise the fourth day in a row without significant rainfall, I could no longer use the weather as an excuse for continuing to avoid a necessary chore.

See this huge deck? What was I thinking when I determined the size to be constructed? Actually, it's obvious I wasn't considering maintenance of same. Today I needed to put a coat of stain on this expanse.

I gathered up all the stuff I'd need, and resigned myself to an afternoon of pushing a paint pad back and forth forever and ever, amen. The deck goes around the far side of the house, then widens again in front.




First, though, I had to clean up the mess the magpies made having a puff ball (mushroom) picnic on the steps. How do I know it was magpies?

Whenever there's mischief afoot, magpies are involved. Always.


I emptied the quarter can of stain into a painter's tray, then opened the last full gallon to mix with it.

Well, well, well.


The paint person at Home Depot had neglected to put tinting pigment in the can! Golly, gee. Too bad I had only enough stain to paint the rim facia.





Ah, saved by incompetence. Gotta love it.