No update since September

I stay so busy with life in general that I forget stuff.  Like updating the blog.

Much has occurred since the last update, we bought and placed a new container and moved, placed and leveled about 85 yards of earth.  I have also poured and run some of the corner piers for the cabin.  Once I finish these most important piers I can proceed as the remaining piers are much easier to do with the corners accurately placed.

Now hopefully, the rest of the construction will proceed as quick as weather and our health will allow.  I hope to keep up with the blog as construction progresses.

So as always, cheers

Sighting in

Things are coming into alignment, literally.  I have acquired many of the needed tools and equipment I was lacking to really get going on the land grading and cabin construction.

We are now hoping to get started in mid October with actual earth moving, grading and foundation work.  We still have to close up our driveway and finish our columns.  As my business back east had dragged itself into monthly trips to Florida and South Carolina, I am pleased to report that at least for the somewhat distant future, I will not need to return there.  All for the better as I cannot stand to travel via airline any longer.  That is quite a shame too for when I traveled regularly with my job and on vacation trips with family, I enjoyed flying.  But I digress.

In any case, we have roughed in our plans for accommodations at the little desert place.  We had already purchased and semi-located a shipping container.  We just purchased another and will locate it in the next few weeks, probably then set it permanently and move things from the first container either to be left outside or located inside the new container depending on how easily they could disappear or be weather damaged.  We also plan to repair the damaged blackwater tank on our small RV trailer and also swap the axles from over the springs to under the springs to add ground clearance.  We have visitors planning to swing by in mid October and after they come and go we will locate the little camper at the little desert place.  BTW, we still have not reached agreement on names for our little desert place.  Many possibilities, many ideas...

While the idea of shelter may seem simple to many, to me much more comes to mind.  While a tent can provide shelter it is too temporary, too non-secure, too weather sensitive for us, so we will ratchet our structure up some from that basic level.  We have decided to do a steel framed cabin as they have excellent protection from weather, are structurally vastly superior to stick built, basically fire resistant depending on interior framing, and much more secure from tampering and burglars.

with the coming of cooler fall weather we should progress quickly.  I will make an honest effort to photograph and document what we are doing while we are doing it in the future.  I realize the value of this for my own future reminiscing as well as construction methods for others interested in my choice of materials and how to.

Without lots of boring resume type details on my background, I will offer this general outline of my past experience which I believe qualifies me for this job:  I learned carpentry from my father, concrete work and masonry from hobby projects aided and advised by a journeyman mason friend.  Mechanics and welding from trade classes in school, one year in a machine shop welding and forty five years of projects from building and drag racing cars, auto repairs, welding, hardfacing and equipment or utility trailer construction.  Now add in my career in telephony and radio frequency applications.  It may be easy to see why I find most things mechanical are easier to learn and even if not mastered are learned well enough to be useful.

So now as an early retiree, I look with great pleasure at my future.  It is time to put my skills to use for my wife and myself.

As always, Cheers!!

Road blocks

It has been far too long since any progress has been made at the little place in the desert.  This main culprit this year has been weather.  Mostly rain, excessive amounts of rain.  The ranch road going in suffers greatly from erosion during heavy rains.  Last time I towed in our run about RV trailer, I damaged the black water tank.  The road only got worse for a couple of months after that.  Pulling the trailer in became impossible just as if the road had been blocked.

 Without access for a sleeping and cool down place on site, the work all but stopped.  In early July, I along with my wife and two friends took advantage of a short dry and not too hot spell to go and pour concrete bases for gate columns.  The road had gotten so bad that I nearly was forced to run my truck in four wheel drive to pull my utility trailer in with the load of concrete sacks and cinder blocks.  In any case, we worked furiously to get as much done by midday as we could.  I regret not taking photos of the work as it progressed.

 I had to make an unexpected trip to South Carolina and Florida in mid July and while I was traveling the road maintenance crew graded all of the roads in the area.  I was pleasantly surprised to see the fantastic condition of the road going in.  So I should take the small RV in and park it, right?  Well on the trip east, I experienced a roof leak around a roof repair that has become damaged again.  I will need to completely remove the old repair and start over with a new repair before the camper can be used.  I have to make a return trip to Florida to finish the business from the first trip and the repair will have to wait until I get home.  I may try to take advantage of a not so hot day forecast next week to run the block columns up.

Cheers!

Ode to our non human friends

I spent most of a long trip back and forth to the former homestead thinking about some friends lost.  Sometimes we takes friends for granted.  Usually the friends are human, sometimes not.  Most of us have had a friend who was not human, "pets" as they are called.  Our creator certainly knew we would need some unspeaking, loyal non-human companions.  While riding along on these trips, I have time to think and contemplate.  On this trip, my thoughts kept drifting to some of my furry friends lost to only my memory.

I had two friends who recently lost furry friends and when trying to offer my thoughts I always come back to the rainbow bridge poem I have seen many times before.  When I lose a pet, I always wonder if I did enough to meet their needs, gave enough love, paid enough attention to their acts of unconditional, selfless love for me.  When we had a death in our family of a furry one, after burial in the garden, I always told my children that if they closed their eyes and used their imagination they would see all of them in the garden playing together.

So today, going through boxes of old photos, I found one of our family's beloved dogs with my children long ago.  Again, I am brought back to the "Rainbow Bridge" poem.  So for Ol' Gal, Dollar, Goku, Rocco, Callie, Trixie and many, many other family members no longer with us:

Just this side of heaven is a place called Rainbow Bridge.
When an animal dies that has been especially close to someone here, that pet goes to Rainbow Bridge. There are meadows and hills for all of our special friends so they can run and play together. There is plenty of food, water and sunshine, and our friends are warm and comfortable.
All the animals who had been ill and old are restored to health and vigor. Those who were hurt or maimed are made whole and strong again, just as we remember them in our dreams of days and times gone by. The animals are happy and content, except for one small thing; they each miss someone very special to them, who had to be left behind. They all run and play together, but the day comes when one suddenly stops and looks into the distance. His bright eyes are intent. His eager body quivers. Suddenly he begins to run from the group, flying over the green grass, his legs carrying him faster and faster.
You have been spotted, and when you and your special friend finally meet, you cling together in joyous reunion, never to be parted again. The happy kisses rain upon your face; your hands again caress the beloved head, and you look once more into the trusting eyes of your pet, so long gone from your life but never absent from your heart.
Then you cross Rainbow Bridge together.... 
Author unknown...

Driveway

Access is completed, we now have a decent usable driveway into our patch of desert.

 

We pulled our small camper down and made a four day working party to get it squared away.  Now we will place a container we bought and put up some shade.  Once we have shade in place, we will begin our cabin and be much more free to come and go.

I hope to keep this blog more active though not a daily blog by any means.

Our reward for the first few overnights were great sunsets and the stillness of the nighttime desert.

As always, Cheers!!

Snow on the Ocotillo

Well, it has been a crazy winter so far in west Texas.  I regret not keeping track of the precipitation totals.  I have lost count of the measurable snows and rains.  I hope we are done with it.  I am happier when there is no snow on the Ocotillo.

We rearranged some plans to help a friend today, left his place and went by the little place in the desert to do some more surveying (not with transit and rod mind you, just walking and absorbing) and we are finally satisfied with our choice for a permanent spot to live.  We have to now do some basic leveling and then we will bring in the transit and rod and bring it all into spec.  Our new dawn is just around the corner.

Cheers!!

Fits, starts and broken bones

Well, finally closed on our property in early December.  Had only enough time after closing to run down to the place and toast our success with a bottle of Riesling.  Went back to work and then went to Odessa for a supply run.  We had clutch troubles and had to get it replaced while we were there.  Stuck in the oil patch for three days...

While we were there we found out a friend from Brewster county had been in a bad accident while alone and he was in the hospital in Odessa.  When our truck was ready and before we came back to Alpine we stopped in and had a visit with him.  It is fortunate for him he is alive, the desert is unforgiving when bad things happen to folks while they are alone.  A stark reminder for us we need to invest in the air ambulance insurance just in case.

Well, we went back to the east coast for the holidays, bought a big flat deck trailer, loaded a small RV trailer we have on the big trailer and made it back just before west Texas was hammered by an unusual winter ice storm.

So now, we have some detail property surveying we need to do to see where we will place our cabin and other infrastructure, rent an excavator and a tracked loader and get busy carving out a place to resume our life put on hold since retirement in July.

As always, prayer is welcomed as we embark on this next phase of our lives.

Cheers!!