6/24-26/03 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

I had another meeting late Tuesday so my schedule was the same as last week. I arrived at 9:30 PM, moved in, talked to Ellen, and went to bed.

On Wednesday morning, I chinked one seam before lunch. A chipmunk got up on the scaffold with me so I fed him his treat up there.

It was 80 degrees out so I took a little nap after lunch to avoid the hottest part of the day. Then I went out and chinked one more seam. That finished the chinking for that position of the scaffold. Larry stopped by and visited while I used up one batch of mortar. The sack of mortar mix I was using must have been bad because the three batches I got out of the sack acted like they didn't have enough cement. It didn't set up very fast at all and would slump away from the top log a lot more than normal. It made the chinking slow going and hard to do. I was glad to get into the next sack which behaved noticeably better. It would be nice to be able to detect a bad sack before I buy it.

On Thursday, on my way up to work I saw an owl fly out of the building and land on the same perch in the woods that he did before. I sure hope the chipmunks and squirrels are careful. I don't care so much about the mice. I used a trowel and a whisk broom to clean off mortar debris from the wall and then I plugged a bunch of worm holes with caulk. Then I called it good and dismantled the scaffolds.

It was 80 degrees again and very hot for working. I set up the five scaffold frames against the northwest foundation wall using 2x4s and a 4x4 for supports. This will allow me to reach the rest of the northwest wall and finish the outside chinking job. After lunch, I left for home at 1:30.