wegenering

Caulk Boots
Posted by: ycd0108, 02:33 PM GMT del 29 Marzo 2012 +0
April Fools:
The big saw is running again!
"Six feet deep in Big Muddy
And the big fool said: "Push on!"
As usual there is a story:
Michael worked with me on the first house I built here on the Island. He had been planning to take a boat building course and I was renting the top floor of his house with him in the basement. I had the job but no crew and few tools so I went down and said:
"Why don't you come and work with me and we'll both learn something?"
We drove together for a number of years. One sunny morning we finished our coffee and were walking back onto the new floor we planned to put some perimeter walls up on and CBC radio started playing Alan Stivel's "Suite des Montagnes".

Anyhow Mike and I started stepping around on the new floor.
He left us 24 years ago and designated the big saw and the Alaska Mill to Ron (I am still using his Hitachi Planer and Makita router), who I went on to ride with for 14 years.
Previous:
Pronounced: Cork.
Tloml brought a pair of these boots home for me yesterday. I don't mind sawing up logs but I hate shopping. Haven't worn corks since I worked on log booms in the late '70s so it takes a bit of getting used to: your foot won't slip is the good news - last thing you need on a pile of logs is a slip. The bad news is: your foot really won't slip - that can also be a problem 'cause logging often requires some fancy footwork.
I had two painful lessons way back then:
1) I had been wearing light running shoes while operating the skidder and gotten used to hopping aboard with decent traction on the steel surfaces. After dancing around wearing the corks on the floating logs - you have to stay in motion because most of the logs will sink under you or roll - I jumped on to the plate steel fender of the skidder. The corks scratched the paint but did not create any friction at all. A "face plant" on the back of the skidder was lesson #1.
2) You get used to the boots gripping on wet logs. I was back on the skidder with runners on and needed to secure the boom logs to shore. I was using the dance step learned wearing corks and all went fine till the runners hit a portion of the log that had been debarked. Luckily it was shallow water but I still don't know which face plant is worse - the fender of a skidder or a large log in waist deep water. Took me a while to find my glasses.
Here is a link to some poetry by and about some loggers:
http://www.wdmoore.ca/mp3/disc1/caulkboots.html
 
 
Updated: 04:03 PM GMT del 05 Aprile 2012   Permalink | A A A
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Ralph (not his real name)
Posted by: ycd0108, 02:46 AM GMT del 28 Marzo 2012 +0
Why are all my clients so strange?
I figure it might be 'cause the "Normals" out there want a "normal" builder.
You know: Drives up in a newish pickup and gets out with his blackberry to "make an estimate".
That kind of thing. Seems to reassure people if the contractor looks semi prosperous.
I never will make a "lot of money" but I've got many houses out there keeping the rain off the inhabitants.
I arrive in a 20 year old Chev pickup and I cancelled my cell phone some years ago.
I built the main house for Ralph about 1978-9 and added some SqFtage last year. Edit
But the other clients are almost as weird as Ralph.
I'm being careful here because I've given some my WU handle.
It has always been good fun. I could not go back to building "Spec. Houses" even if I wanted to. The Younguns are better, cheaper and faster than me.
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Hoping Karma is not Instant
Posted by: ycd0108, 01:23 AM GMT del 24 Marzo 2012 +0
The Faller is coming manana to drop some tall trees around the garden. My 38 year old daughter remembers that she was the same height as one Balsam that is doomed. She was maybe 4 years old then. She's about 5'11" now and the Balsam is about 60' and a beautiful tree. I went out and apologized to the tree and I'll ask George, the Faller, to leave a long butt so I can mount the Sun Dial (all brass, Lee Valley) I got for Christmas.
I used to do my own felling which is probably why my right wing is kinda iffy: the Stihl 051 (3' bar) would leak chain oil into the cylinder if I didn't leave the saw standing on end. When the cylinder is full of oil and you yank the starter chord something has to give and it won't be the saw.
It's gonna be a mess of limbs and stumps whatever I think. As Butch Cassidy said (or he should have) to Sundance Kid when they jumped:
"Both feet. Let's Go!"
PS: I now keep a "Husky" 365 with a 30" bar sharp and fueled under the work bench - that's where and how I want it.
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Soon it will Spring.
Posted by: ycd0108, 04:50 AM GMT del 20 Marzo 2012 +0
Official Spring will arrive in a few hours. Our spring weather can be just about anything including warm,calm sunshine and heavy wet snow. Tonight is not really cold but noticably "raw" out there with a wind warning for later. Possible snow flurries.
I'm getting some progress on my latest "Octagon" schatzkammer: Got the main frame epoxied together and only another four or eight small shelves to fit in.
What amazes me is how the smallest errors magnify as you build out. I'm used to it from many years of trying to make wood behave but this smaller stuff is worse than building an house. The thin slats I use will not take a nail or a screw so I saturate the joint with epoxy and then hold the frame together with duct tape and light clamping till the epoxy kicks off. The epoxy is one of the best lubricants I have seen until it turns to stone. I have to go back often to push parts that slowly ooze out of position for some hours. In fact, that's what I'm going to do just now.
If I can find the iPod there will be a picture here someday.
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Kitchen Table
Posted by: ycd0108, 02:39 AM GMT del 11 Marzo 2012 +1
This blog is not about this house in which I live. It's about the blogs:
I've got a fairly modest shack here on Wunderground but it suits me. Especially when somebody comes over and decorates it with a bit of music, a link to something interesting or some of their own thoughts and experiences.
Sorta reminds me of the dynamic around the kitchen table where visitors would drop in, get a coffee or whatever and sit down. Then the fun would start. Stories (usually told by the most deaf because they were more comfortable talking than trying to understand what others might say) would start up and everyone tossed in a bit here and there - quite often the piece they contributed was: "Heard that."
Now and then the "Thang" would take off and the group around the table seemed to meld. The "Feather" went to anyone who wanted to speak loud enough for the deafer (mostly old loggers and farmers) to hear.
If you were not loud enough they simply started another story most had already heard.
I am mixing childhood with later life here. When I moved to the Island I gravitated to a wider group but selected those who knew about the "Farm House" Kitchen Table. (Or they selected me).
So the blogs remind me of that table.
Everyone is welcome and we make our own call as to who we read and who we respond to.
Every now and then a "Drunken Uncle" would show up in my early experiences. They also were welcomed and served but there was a general sigh of relief if they could drive away to harass someone else.
I see a lot of parallels on the blogs with the Kitchen Table.
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Hay Wire
Posted by: ycd0108, 03:52 PM GMT del 08 Marzo 2012 +0
Maybe it's due to the CME but comment post times are looking very odd just now.
We are dogless for a short while. Roxy's real "owner" got back last night. Jet lag is not so bad coming west in my experience but we probably modified Roxy - for one thing she had a waist when she left. When we took over she was somewhat overweight. This animal weighs in at less than 8 pounds so a pound here or there shows up dramatically.
Goin' back into the crawlspace today
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Now looking at the potential of humans (including myself) with regard to understanding complex natural phenomena.

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