There is Totally Wireless in my House

First Blog Post From Inside the House!

Much to tell.

Tar-paper is on the roof, the stove is assembled, Patrick made me a skateboard shelf and there is now a tiled platform for the stove to sit on (it'll take three days to dry).  

More and photos when I have time.  It's Halloween night!  I gotta go eat dinner and get all weird!

love,

Wes

First Meal in the Cabin

We ate our first meal in my house tonight. Will and Patrick helped build a table, temporarily seal up the big holes with plastic, and clean out the house proper's basement. So we done got treated to KFC straight from Bedford Ave.

I'm glad they gave us corn on the cob instead of in a bowl.

We cleaned our plates. Bitchin'

My Parents' Housing Project Eclipses Mine

This is only one of two additions my folks added to their Northern Wisconsin lake home/cabin. it's both "en" & "dis"-couraging.

I didn't work on the house all weekend. Tomorrow and Tuesday aren't looking so hot either. The good news is I'll be moving in on Wednesday! It's crazy. I have some vague plans to whip a desk and some shelves together, but no real solid ideas. This past weekend has been good for the soul, but not so much for the mind and body... Anyways, some slacking is good for me.

To be honest, it won't be a true move-in anyways. I'll continue to stay in the city until the house gets a little more weather-proofed and heated. The stove is on its way, but the chimney is yet non-existent. It will probably take another week before it'll be a suitable place to stay. See you then!

Everything Was Beautiful Yes Those Days

It's a beautiful rainy Saturday morning. There is no house news to report.

No News is Good News

Only Old News is Good News

Sometimes Bad News is Good News

Bowery House. Love this place. That's an order.

His name was George, but everyone had always called him Gregory. It wasn't explainable.

One day he visited the zoo and felt a profound connection to a giant rodent, the Capybara.

indow to him.

arrows

things look pretty good to me

flags for the future

racks and tools

blue and new

sport hammock-ing, backstage

catapult to satiation

Neal's View to the landmarks i knew

fancy parks, squirrels, pop up ads

No Snow is No Standing is

How can anyone stand to not be smiling? The power of no or none is actually a negative value. To take the square route, mankind had to create a construct to allow it to exist in a rational world. Thus, the base of no or none can not be expressed in a natural language and the product should be treated as such -Carefully, like the smallpox virus, deep down, toeing the edge of extinction.

as long as it is somewhere

slides

art handling experience preferred

emily got me this really great window.

Family Times

there's a tree in my house and yes there is

anyone want to name my skull? it's a contest. you win something.

two lights chop saw circular saw hand saw hack saw hand jig saw three cordless drills level screws and fasteners drill bits and sockets wrenches chalk line angle gauge ratcheting tie downs gloves power strip extension cord ladders tarp caulk gun staple gun vise grips torch safety goggles hammers nails screwdriver sharpie- this should rhyme

standing by the wall above our head

Good Wood god bone

Staples

these ended up being three winners, lined up like roll call. everything was beautiful that day.

A Roof Has Been Raised

Yesterday Patrick and I got all the insulation and plywood installed!

It was a good day. First thing I cleaned out all the brush that had been piling up around the house. The ladders have never been so maneuverable. An old basketball rim and backboard was also added to the big pile of stuff.

The yard cleaned of fallen tree branches. We have lots of kindling now.

Once Patrick arrived, we laid in some more styrofoam and hauled the remaining sheets of plywood up on the roof. I tacked in some 2 x 4 pieces to keep everything from sliding off the house while we worked on the insulation. We covered the entire roof, save one 24'' x 48'' section right in the center of the top of the roof where the chimney will be installed. It is also a perfect hatch to the roof from the big ladder inside.

Access hatch/chimney hole. The place is kinda dark now that the roof is up, but the styrofoam gives the place a nice clean white ceiling that reflects a lot of radiant light. Once the stove is in, electricity is the next thing. I'll need lights to work in the house during the day now.

View of the chimney hole from the interior. The big ladder is perfect for working on the house. This ladder was almost definitely built by the original owner of the work shop. There is a matching ladder that is much bigger that Will found in the basement. It is awesome! It's also too heavy to safely move by one's self (I almost dropped it into a second story window leaning it against the house!).

Speaking of chimneys- I neglected to mention that the stove has been ordered and is on its way! I really wanted "The Lit'l Sweetie", but Vogelzang told me they were back ordered until November. Ebay had the next largest model for a really good price, so expect a photo of me cooking chili on the more modest and descriptively-named "Standard Boxwood Stove" in a few weeks! Yum! This one has two cooking ranges.

The next item on the grocery list is the chimney. Vogelzang suggested Duravent chimney systems, and unless something amazing and cheap comes along, I'll go with them. Their installation manuals are available online and are very informative.

It gets dark super-early these days. The sun is also a little lower each morning during my commute to work. Today, in order to fight the season, I went to work 20 minutes late. The sun was slightly higher than it was the previous day while going over the bridge. Hell yes, and to hell with you, short days!

Enjoy those light holes while they last.

Foil tape left overs.

Patrick and I were just about to put the last screws in the plywood when Emily brought us some hot toddys to enjoy on top of the new hang out spot. We had light, music, a fire (below us) and beautiful yellow and green leaves mere feet from our faces to enjoy while we laid on our backs, enjoying the fruits of our labor. I am into it! It's too bad the roof can't stay clean bare wood forever, it will never be more enjoyable to lay down on. -at least not until we put a deck on in the springtime.

Fire, fire, smoke and lights.

Early evenings and late nights.

Presents and changes, nothing stays the same.

Commence the Roof Construction!

Today we started working on the roof itself! The roof, sloped, rising or falling, covering and concealing. Shelter! The one thing Stonehenge is missing.

Patrick and Will helped a lot today! We didn't work long, but accomplished much. About 20% of the roof is now covered. First, we put a running 1 x 10 across the end of the eave. This gave a 2'' lip for the styrofoam to sit against. The 2 foot styrofoam sheets were laid in vertically and nailed in with roofing nails (I spent two trips to HD looking for the nails with plastic washers at the heads, but couldn't find any longer than 2''). On top of the foam the plywood sheathing was installed horizontally.

Spider Patrick making it happen.

Teamwork.

For those building themselves- always install your beefy materials across as many supports as possible. This increases the overall strength of the structure. In this case, the styrofoam only runs over two rafters, but the plywood is screwed into five rafters. Also, stagger your seams. I did a good job staggering my seams on the floor, but zoned out today and forgot to do the same for the roof. No biggie though- it'll get sealed up and be really strong when it is done.

We can now chill on the roof! Holy buckets of new chill spots! I can't wait to get really high while really high.

Good times. We'll do more tomorrow. The forecast is looking gooooooooood.

fuckin'-a Bubba (my dad taught me that).

Sunday is not my Day of Rest

...even though I was brought up Roman Catholic (we drink a lot. it was okay).

What could be behind this green door? How does it open? Magicking?

Moving on- Sunday was rainy. As every cloud has a silver lining, the moody weather Sunday morning afforded us a gentle and more eased version of Home Depot than I am used to. Consumers note: Stormy mornings equal less people at the hardware store. Or any store maybe.

This is a fully-loaded orange cart. We had to buy some twine just to make sure everything stayed put. As soon as we got home and cut the twine, a bunch of styrofoam blew off and was damaged. This stuff is both expensive and fragile, let it be written.

A nice HD employee let me know the styrofoam didn't have a UPC and I'd need to go get the digits for the checkout girl. This is what digital cameras were made for. My good friend Patrick likes to take digi photos of Google Maps wherever he is going. It is genius.

Emily helped me pick up all the major roofing supplies:

16 sheets of 2'' x 2' x 4' white styrofoam

8 sheets of 3/4'' x 4' x 8' plywood sheathing

1 extra brace for rafter hanging

15 angle brackets for whatever

4'' screws for the roof

nails for the styrofoam

100 square feet of white gypsum-backed tar paper

a roll of twine

a tube of Great Stuff (you should always have some of this)

150' of cold weather foil tape

We were able to roll all this back home on the orange cart. I wouldn't have been able to do it alone. A line has been crossed in which I can no longer continue the project without some sort of buddy system. My knee hurts and I can't continue to lift things without help or I'll end up hurting myself in a bad way. So come help already! I'm also going to be posting an ad for an unpaid internship soon. The management gave one request- the intern must be really cool in order to be spending time hanging around the house. I think they'll stay busy enough not to "hang out" much. Interested parties please send me an email.

Sophie loves her new house. She likes to come in and talk about what furniture I should build for her and where the furniture is going to go. She thinks the chandelier should go "there".

Stashed styrofoam.

So we got all the stuff stashed in the house. The Bustelo was running strong on top of a delicious open face egg and cheese bagel sandwich and a sugar-free red bull. My eyes were still a bit flat, so I smoked a cigarette while cutting the last notch for the first to last rafter.

Self-timers still baffle me a bit. I would think that the timer icon with a "2" next to it would be longer than the icon with no numbers. In fact, the "2" setting is about 1/10 the delay of the non-quantified setting.

...there we go. May I interest you in some clear liquid? or a small mammalian skull?

The last two rafters went up easily, but my body was screaming sickness. It was time to close up shop and go home to the city (home is in the city for the next few weeks) somewhere around 4-5 p.m. I got to bed by 9:30 that night. Holy Buckets of sleep.

Mostly Constructive Construction

This is a Brooklyn rain gauge. It looks like we got three joints of rain on Thursday.

Yesterday was a good day for construction. Work let out right on time, it wasn't raining, and it wasn't too cold (and it was Friday). I headed over to Emily's backyard and started working without too much dilly-dally. The tarp had filled up with water again and was leaking into the house. This was no good. The floor had some standing water in a localized spot. I mopped a little of it up and put the space heater on it. By the end of the night, it was dry-ish on top, but there is plenty of moisture between my plywood and foam. Zoot alors! It doesn't seem like something to worry about now, there are bigger fish to fry.

After a few rafters went up, Will fed me a really good peppers, rice and beans dish. It was the perfect spiciness. Emily and John came back from a walk and we smoked in the living room while looking at coasters, cats and each other.

Rafters in progress. I cut these channels because I wanted an over-sized eave to protect the old wall. It will also be a place to sit in the rain and snow and hang pretty things from. I'll probably add some braces later, and a running board on the face to support the roof while it goes up.

Getting back to work was difficult. When I accelerate in any direction, it requires buckets of energy. Energy expenditure behind, I done got oriented and almost hung the whole roof.

working at night went well. I blew a fuse early in the evening with both lights plugged in with the space heater and the music going. Someone turned something on in the house and that was all she wrote. Electric is now at the top to the priority list along with everything else. Sloane NYC is going to loan some light cans for the project which will be awesome, but I'll need my own power line as to not compete with the house.

The circular saw needed a blade change. The speed and ease of the new blade was immediately noticeable. Getting extra blades is completely necessary for any job like this, do not attempt building a structure without sharp tools. I will look into getting my old ones sharpened.

Hung beams. I mostly worked under the tarp the whole night. The interior didn't provide space to do things assembly-line style, so I cut one beam at a time, put up the brackets, cut out a channel in the outer wall, step-by-step for each beam. There are two left. My place felt like a house working with the door closed. The big lamp also kept the place just warm and comfortable enough so my fingers didn't get cold.

Being stoned had its advantages- the music sounded great coming out of the little cassette player, many ideas for construction and interior design sublimed from the sawdust, and I wasn't cold a bit. On the opposite side of that coin was devoting a lot of time to staring at things, immobile and rapt for minutes at a time.

Good news- "Staring at things for minutes" has been also filed into the "PRO" pile, because these forays into the shallow subconscious were just the kind of breaks my body and mind needed. By the time I had packed everything up, it was 1:30 a.m. and time to go to the city for "sleep". "Sleep" usually consists of going to the store and drinking, or going to Bowery and drinking and internet-ing.

Piles of Ibuprofen were also on the menu (my knee is "okay", but should probably be getting more rest).

A misty decision was made to use some twine i found under the floor to tie up some of the old house. I think I'll leave it like that. This is the kind of place where doing things right meets doing things right now.

Music Machine. Last night I listened to The Clash, The Cure, Sleeping in the Aviary, Nouvelle Vague, Bob Dylan, The Ponys, and Television.