7/17-19/01 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

While I was packing up to go, I got a call from Home Depot saying that the planer blades were in and that I could pick them up. I stopped in on my way and bought three packages of two blades each. That gives me 12 edges plus the one good one left on the blade currently in the machine. I figured that should last me for a while.

It was good to be back working after being away for so long. I arrived at 1:30 and it was a pleasantly cool 65 degrees. Just right. Everything was undisturbed and the water was running nice and clear. There was also no gas smell so tightening that fitting must have done the trick.

The gas pressure seemed to be low so I boiled some water and poured it on the indicator on the tank to see if it was empty. Sure enough, it was completely empty. This surprised me because I didn't think Ellen and I used that much gas on our visit. I decided to fill the tanks at the Parkside Grocery, but when I disconnected them, I discovered that the other tank had a lot of gas in it. I don't have an indicator on that tank so I couldn't tell until I lifted it.

I figured the problem must be in the regulator and that it was failing to keep the level in the two tanks equal. I hooked the tanks up again but I reversed their positions. I will have to figure out how to get that regulator to draw them down equally. It's always something.

After getting settled, I went to work and finished making and installing the last of the 6x8 pressure treated ledgers for the porch. Then I torqued all the nuts holding them to the wall. I laid some 4x4s I had gotten from Doris, next door, from the ledger to the main porch beam and then laid 3-inch planks on top of the 4x4s to form a scaffold in front of the southeast wall at roughly the level of the final porch deck. This was the first time I could walk out the front door of the building and step down onto the deck. It was pretty neat even though it is only temporary.

On Wednesday morning, I laid some more 3-inch planks on the 4x4s so that there were two planks together all along the wall except right in front of the door where there are three planks. I shimmed all the planks so they were all steady when you walked on them. Then I got five of my hanging scaffold brackets that I used when building the log walls, and bolted them to the outside of the southeast wall.

Before lunch, I went up on the high rock to check on the logs I had pulled up there. I wanted to make sure that they were up off the dirt. One end of one was in the dirt, so I levered it up onto a rock. Quite a bit of the bark seemed to be loose, so I went and got the spud and spudded quite a bit of the bark off each of the logs. Some of the bark was very tight, but some of it came off easily. I don't know when I will get around to gwizzing these logs, so it will slow down the deterioration the more bark I get off now. When I was just about finished spudding, Larry stopped by for a short visit. When he left, I went in for lunch.

After lunch, I used 2x12 planks to span across the hanging brackets. This formed a scaffold that allowed me to reach the entire southeast wall. I shimmed the planks and screwed them down and I installed 2x4 handrails on the brackets. Then I set to work planing the outside of the log wall. There are no windows in the top half of the wall so all the logs are full length. This made the planing pretty easy because there were no obstructions. I got quite a bit done before I went in for the night.

On Thursday morning, I decided to harvest some blackberries. There were so many red berries that it looked like Christmas with the red berries against the green leaves. There weren't many that were ripe enough to harvest, though. I only got about 8 ripe berries. I figure that next week I should get a bumper crop of berries -- that is if someone or some animal doesn't beat me to them. We'll see.

I went back to planing on the log wall, but I stopped in time to clean up the chips and to board up the living room window. Now that the scaffold is in place, vandals would be able to enter through that window if I didn't board it up.

At about 1:30 I was almost packed and ready to go home when Phil and Jean Geertgens drove up in their fancy RV. It had been several years since I had seen them so I was really glad they caught me before I left. I opened the building back up, we took a lot of pictures of each other, and we took the grand tour. Then we sat in their RV and they showed me all the high-tech features it had. And, finally they showed me an album of pictures of the big house they just built in Arizona. It was a delightful visit. After they left, I closed things up and got on the road about 2:40.

7/24-26/01 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

I arrived at 11:40. The weather was a pleasant 75 degrees. It was breezy so that kept the few mosquitos from being much of a bother. I started out by picking blackberries. The patch is getting pretty big now and there are a lot of red berries. There was at least one ripe berry on each clump, though, so I was able to pick two cups of them.

After the berries were washed and in the freezer, I got started planing on the southeast wall. I had just gotten a good start when Marielle showed up. She had planned to visit the project this afternoon. This was the first time she had visited it since I was working on the foundation but she had been keeping current by looking at pictures. We did the grand tour including the spring, and we visited for quite a while in the building. We also took a few pictures of each other. While we were in the basement, we heard a tree frog croaking from somewhere inside. I was glad to hear him, or her, because I haven't heard many frogs at all this year. It may be too dry, or maybe there aren't enough mosquitos to eat. Anyway, I was glad that they haven't all disappeared.

After Marielle left, I got back to planing and got quite a bit done before I quit for the day.

At 5:30 on Wednesday morning, it was barely light enough for me to see an owl sitting on the next-to-top log end sticking out of the south corner of the building. The top of his head looked like it just touched the log above the one he was sitting on. I zoomed the lens on the camera as big as it would go and took a picture of him through the trailer window, and then went back to sleep. When I got up, he was still sitting there and he stayed until just after 8:00. All the while he would periodically turn his head, presumably looking for mice and chipmunks. I think he might be the reason I don't see any chipmunks running around this year.

After breakfast, I resumed planing the logs on the top half of the southeast wall. Since there are no windows up there, the logs are all full length so there were no obstacles for the planer except at the ends. That made the job fairly easy, but there was still a lot of square footage. Earl stopped by for a visit during the morning, so I took a break and we had a nice chat. As I remember it, we solved most of the major problems of the world. After he left, I finished planing the top half of the wall. Instead of continuing with the bottom half, I decided to finish the top first. That way, I could remove the hanging scaffolding before I started on the bottom. So the next order of business is to sand the parts I couldn't reach with the planer, apply the Board Defense insecticide, and two coats of stain, and then dismantle the scaffold.

Before I quit for the night, I did some more spudding of the logs up on the high rock. Most of the bark was on super tight, but some of it was loose. I wanted to get as much of the loose bark off as I could. I got quite a bit of it off, but my shoulders can only take so much spudding at a time so there was still quite a bit to go.

While I was fixing my dinner, I heard a frog croaking just outside the trailer. That was another welcome sound.

On Thursday I used the DeWalt sander with 60 grit paper to sand the corners and depressions in the logs that the planer couldn't reach. I was hoping to finish applying the insecticide before I went home, but by the time I finished sanding and brooming off all the logs, it was time to board up the door and get ready to leave. I left about 1:30.

7/31-8/2/01 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

I got a late start, and I visited with Marilyn on the way up, so I didn't arrive until 1:30. I mixed up a three gallon batch of Board Defense and sprayed a good soaking of it on the top half of the southeast wall. To give it time to dry, I went down to the berry patch and picked two cups of ripe berries. While I was picking berries, I listened to tapes from a series of lectures on political philosophy. That worked pretty well, but now when I look at those berry bushes, I think about Socrates and Plato. I guess that's okay. It might help me remember what I learned.

By the time I had washed the berries and got them into the freezer, it was after 5:00 and I was tired so I decided to wait until morning to do any staining. The logs would be drier then anyway.

On Wednesday, I applied two coats of TWP 501C Cedar Tone stain to the top half of the southeast wall. I must say, they look a lot better than they did a couple weeks ago. Then I dismantled the hanging scaffolds and put the planks and frames away. I finished the day by doing some more spudding of the logs on the high rock.

On Thursday morning, I woke up with a headache. I don't think I drank enough the day before so I drank a glass of Endurox. I may also be feeling effects of breathing the fumes from the stain. Anyway, I started out by picking another cup of berries that had ripened in the previous two days. Then I went up and got a start on planing the logs on the lower half of the wall. My headache didn't completely go away so I took a couple aspirin when I quit for lunch. I left for home at 12:45. The aspirin did the trick because by the time I got home, I felt fine.

8/7/-9/01 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

I arrived at 11:15 and found that all the ripe berries were gone. I suspect little furry or feathered critters beat me to them. There probably weren't more than a cup of them ripe anyway.

After moving in and having lunch, I went to work planing the logs on the lower half of the southeast wall. I got about half of that job done before I quit for the day.

On Wednesday morning, I went back to work planing and got about 3/4 of the lower half of the wall done. I was running the plane through a particularly big knot when all of a sudden I smelled smoke and the plane lost most of its power and RPMs. I guess I expected too much out of it. I let it cool a while and when I tried it again, it came up to speed for about a second and then it dropped RPMs again. I figured it was finished for the week.

Since I didn't have much left to plane, I got my two block planes out and tried them. The big one worked pretty well because of the momentum you could build up. After working for a while with this plane, Larry stopped by with a piece of junk mail for me. We had a short visit while I explained my latest setback with the planer.

After he left, I decided to try the gwizard on the remaining logs. The temporary deck on the porch gave me the room I needed to handle the gwizard and I was sure it would be a lot easier than the block plane. I stood a ladder on the deck up against the wall and used it to fasten a C-clamp to the underside of a rafter directly over the logs that still needed planing. Then I tied the sling for the gwizard to the C-clamp.

The saw started right up as I expected it would, and the gwizard worked like a charm. It was a little more awkward gwizzing vertically rather than horizontally, but as long as I worked with the wall to my left, the sling hook could slide all the way around to the left and bottom of the saw handle and suspend the saw with the bar horizontal and the planer head vertical. In just a few minutes, I had gwizzed the rest of the wall. I probably should have used it earlier, although it would only work near the bottom. So I guess I used it for almost as much as I could have anyway.

Next, I got started sanding the corners and hollows where the planer couldn't reach. I also used my big heavy wood chisel.. I sharpened it razor sharp and it worked pretty well for some hollowed out spots that the sander couldn't get.

On Thursday I was hoping to finish the sanding so I could apply the insecticide before I left, but I underestimated the job. I finished sanding the wall but I didn't have time to broom it off or spray it. That will have to wait until next week. I left for home at about 1:30.

8/11/01 Took the planer apart to see if I could diagnose, or even fix the problem. I discovered that the armature was fried. You could see a little discoloration on the deeper windings, and there was a dead short across all the segments of the commutator. On Monday I will see if I can buy a new armature for a reasonable price and get my hands on it right away. If not, I will buy a new planer and chalk the old one up to experience. I won't run the new one as hard either.

8/13/01 Drove to Auburn and bought a new armature for the planer at S-B Power Tools. Then I spent a lot of time trying to pull the old sprocket and bearing off the old armature shaft. I ended up taking it to Handy Andy Tool Rental and after a long struggle with several different bearing pullers, they were able to get them off. The bearing, however, was ruined. I don't know if they ruined it pulling it off, or whether it was bad to start with. I placed an order for a new bearing with Applied Industrial Technologies, 4021 6th Ave S. I also checked the new armature with my meter and discovered that I don't understand how they are wound. The new armature is shorted across each pair of the commutator also. This must be normal, so now I am not so sure the old one is bad.

8/14-16/01 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

I arrived at 12:15. It was a pretty hot 85 degrees out. After moving in, I whisk-broomed the southeast wall to remove all the sawdust and chips. Then I sprayed on two 3-gallon applications of Board Defense. A couple of gray jays stopped for a peanut snack during the process.

On Wednesday I applied two coats of TWP stain. I must say that the wall looks great.

On Thursday morning, I cleaned up the chips. I had spread tarps on and under the temporary porch deck so the cleanup wasn't too hard. There were two big wheelbarrows full of chips. I spread one of them on the trail where the chips were pretty thin, and I dumped the other one on the old chip pile. I'll spread them on the trails later as I get time.

When the chips were cleaned up, I used the 20 foot extension ladder to hang five scaffold brackets halfway up the northwest log wall. I will use these to support a scaffold from which I will stain the top half of the wall, and then move the scaffold down and stain the bottom half. I left for home at 1:40.

8/18/01 Received the new bearing by UPS. I used my vise, which fortunately opens wide enough to take the planer armature lengthwise, plus the width of the bearing and a washer. I pressed the new bearing on and got it into the correct location on the shaft, then I pressed the sprocket onto the end of the shaft. I put the planer back together again with its new armature, and was very gratified that it runs like a charm. I'll see how it does under an actual working load next week, but I don't intend to run it as hard as I did before. I have learned a few things about that planer in the past couple weeks.

8/21-23/01 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

There were a couple long construction delays on the highway and I stopped in to visit with Marilyn on the way up, so I didn't arrive until 1:00. It was a beautiful day and a nice cool 60 degrees.

After moving in, I finished setting up the scaffold brackets, installing the planks, and installing the handrails. Then I spread tarps on the ground to collect the planer chips. When that was done, I got started planing the logs. I was very pleased that the planer worked like new.

While I was working, a really good idea occurred to me. I decided to install permanent anchors in the wall for the scaffold brackets. That way, I would be able to easily set the scaffolds up in order to do maintenance on the walls, or get up there to work for any other reason. After thinking about it, though, I realized that I didn't want half inch rods permanently installed in the walls because they would sweat on the inside in the wintertime. Instead, what I think I will do is to install short PVC pipes in the walls with wood wedges or plugs between the logs inside and out. When I want to fasten a bracket to the wall, I will run the threaded rod through the PVC pipe, a nut and washer on the inside will bear against the wood wedge on the inside of the wall, and the wedge on the outside will provide the support for the rod as it sticks out and goes through the bracket. When not in use, the pipe can be plugged at both ends to keep insects and cold air out. That solves a problem that has been nagging me for years. I have wondered how to get up on those walls to work once the chinking is in place. Now I know.

It started raining Tuesday evening. It rained all night and it rained all Wednesday. The rain caused me no problem, though, because I was working under the eaves. Instead of doing all the planing first, and then doing all of the sanding, like I had done before, I decided to alternate. I figured that would give the planer a periodic rest so it could cool down and wouldn't be as likely to burn out again. By the end of the day, I had finished planing and sanding a little less than half of the top half of the northwest wall.

During the work, a flock of eight or so gray jays came in for peanuts. Some of them looked pretty scruffy from being so wet. When they came into the building, they would shake the water off before they would come over for their peanuts. It was good to see them and I haven't seen such a big flock for quite a while.

On Thursday morning the rain gradually stopped. I was actually glad for the rain because the fire hazard was posted as "Extremely High" and with the fires raging at Leavenworth and Lake Chelan, the rain made me a little less concerned about my own fire risk.

I did some more planing and sanding and got a little past the halfway mark on the wall. I picked up the tarps with the chips and dumped them into the chip pile. Then I boarded things up, had lunch, and left for home at 1:30.

8/28-31/01 I went up to the property for 4 days: Tuesday through Friday.

I spent an extra day up there this week because we camped at Nason Creek over the Labor Day weekend and in order to get a campsite, I planned to register at the campground on Thursday morning and then spend the night Thursday, as the rules require. Since I wouldn't be going back home before we camped, I loaded the pickup with all of our camping gear along with the normal gear I usually take to the property.

Loading all the gear gave me a late start. Bob Burton planned to visit me so when I was ready to leave, I called him to tell him I was leaving. We agreed to meet for lunch at the 59er Diner. He beat me there by a half hour. I got there at 12:45. We had a great visit over lunch, and then we drove to the property.

We spent the afternoon talking and had a great time. We also did some diagnosing of the gas leak by spreading soap suds over the gas fittings in the furnace and tightening the fittings. They were already pretty tight and we saw no evidence of bubbles at all. We ended up not figuring anything out. We did figure one thing out, though. I checked some PVC conduit I had picked up at a garage sale and found that half-inch allthread fits inside perfectly. I have enough of the PVC to make the forty or so tubes I want to put in the walls for the scaffold brackets.

Bob left at about 6:00 and I didn't get much work done that evening except to carry a bathroom sink up to the building. We got the sink free at a swap meet and it might work. If not, we haven't lost anything.

On Wednesday morning I woke up with a headache. I took two aspirin and went back to bed. I woke up later hearing pounding on sheet metal. It took me a while to figure out what it was. The squirrels were harvesting some very green cones from a very high tree above my pickup and my trailer. These made a very loud bang when they hit either the pickup or the metal roof of the snow shed. Since I wasn't feeling too well, I started out scrubbing a wire cooking basket that hadn't been cleaned the last time it had been used. I figured it would be easier to clean it in the trailer with a sink and running water than it would be at the campsite. It was also an excuse not to start planing right away. I didn't think the noise would be good for my headache. Eventually, I did go up and worked on planing and sanding the northwest wall. In the process, I fed the flock of gray jays a bunch of peanuts.

After lunch, I took a nap and woke up feeling a lot better. I went back out and did some more planing and sanding. At about 5:00, a local builder named Jim Raides stopped by to visit and see the place. He was impressed. He and his boss visited me a few years ago before I had done any log work. He said he looks at the building every time he drives by, but he hadn't come up to see it until now. He gave me a lot of good ideas and tips on what to do about the loft railings and some other details. Before he left, he told me he was working for Marc Fisher up the road and Marc wanted to borrow a block and tackle. I told him that in my opinion a couple of come-alongs would work much better and that I was willing to lend him whatever tools he thought would work best. Jim said he would talk to Marc to find out exactly what he wanted to borrow. He left about 7:30 which gave me a fairly late start for my shower and dinner.

When I went in, I sniffed around to see if I could locate the gas leak, and I discovered that the strongest gas smell was directly over a burner on the stove which I rarely use. This was good news. I hadn't even thought that the stove might be leaking since I haven't tampered with it at all. Maybe the valve for that burner has a seal that is drying out or something. Since it was so late, I didn't take the time to try to find the leak. I can do that later.

On Thursday morning after breakfast, I went over to Nason Creek, pitched a tent, and registered for the site. Then I came back and went to work. I finished planing and sanding the top half of the northwest wall. Then I broomed all the chips and sawdust off the wall and sprayed on two 3-gallon applications of Board Defense.

Just as I finished, Jim drove up and said that Marc was adamant that he wanted to use a block and tackle. I got out a big three-sheave block, a matching 2-sheave block, my long yellow rope, and a snap hook and a pulley that were already attached to the rope. I told him those might be useful in the rigging. Jim told me that Marc's place is two driveways this side of Sally's and on the same side of the road. Jim also gave me his phone number, so I feel pretty confident that I will get the tools back.

After I showered and had dinner, I drove back to Nason Creek and slept in the tent. The rules say that a site must be occupied in order to hold it.

During the night, I felt the symptoms of a cold coming on and by Friday morning, I was sure about it. I drove back to the property, had breakfast, and went to work staining the top half of the northwest wall. Ellen called and said she and Andrew would be at the campsite about 3:00 and Bill was planning on arriving at about the same time. I was able to get two coats of TWP on the wall before 2:30. Then I put things away and drove over to Nason Creek to join the family at the camp.

We all drove to the property later on so the family could see the progress on the cabin and so we could leave the van parked there. That saved us $11 per night fee for an extra vehicle. I was hoping the gray jays would show up so they could feed them, but they didn't. We all had fun anyway and it was nice that there were no mosquitos.

On Sunday, after we were done fishing at Fish Lake, we went back to the property to get the van and I closed things up and locked the gate.

I skipped working at the property the week of Sept. 2 because my cold had gotten pretty bad and I had a lot of work to do to prepare for two different Cub Scout meetings. Since I had gotten four days in the previous week, I didn't feel too bad about missing the work. Anyway, nobody's counting.

9/11-13/01 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

My plans for the morning were to drive down to Sea/Tac Airport first thing, and visit with Bob Stuart during his layover. I got ready the night before so I was ready to leave shortly after Ellen left for work. Before I got started, she called me from the bus to tell me about the plane crashes in New York and that the airports were closed. I went back into the house and called Alaska Airlines to see if Bob's plane was going to land on time. They thought that it was already in the air and would probably land on time, so I took off and drove to the airport. I listened to the unfolding events of the terrorist attack on the radio. Bob's plane did not even get off the ground, so after finding that out, I left the airport and drove straight for the property.

On the way, I stopped at Marilyn's. She fed me lunch while we both watched pictures of the disaster on her TV. I finally arrived at the property at 1:30.

After moving in, I brought my radio up to the building so I could keep up on what was happening all during the day. I started out by dismantling the scaffolding on the northwest wall. Then I hung the scaffold frames along the bottom of the same wall so I could work on the bottom half.

On Wednesday morning, I saw an owl fly up and land on the top of the south corner of the building under the eaves. I went out and walked up to the building and watched him for a while. It made him nervous enough to silently fly away. It's amazing how such a big bird can fly without making a sound. I'd just as soon he didn't get into the habit of preying on the chipmunks and squirrels around the building.

I spent the day listening to the radio while I set up the scaffold planks, shims, and handrails. During the work, a pair of gray jays repeatedly came by for peanuts. I also had a chipmunk, actually I think he was a ground squirrel, and a pine squirrel running around while I was working. I guess they have figured out how to keep away from the owls. When the scaffold was ready, I got a good start planing and sanding the log wall.

On Thursday morning, I resumed planing and sanding and finished about a third of the lower half of the southwest wall. In the process, I rescued a little tree frog from a pile of planer chips and I fed the jays some more peanuts. I left for home at about 12:30.

9/18-20/01 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

I got a late start, again, and didn't arrive until 1:15. The weather couldn't have been more perfect. It was a nice cool, sunny 60 degrees with no mosquitos or anything else to complain about. It felt good to get back to the serenity of the mountains after the pressures and demands of civilization.

After moving in, I resumed planing and sanding on the lower half of the northwest wall. So far, it has worked well to alternate between using the planer and the sander. At least I haven't burned up a motor in either tool since I started doing that. The problem is, though, I can't alternate using my shoulders because I have to use both of them at once to run the planer. My shoulders get quite a workout and are very tired and sore by the end of the day.

On Wednesday, I resumed the planing and sanding job and very nearly finished the wall. Earl stopped by in the afternoon so my shoulders got a break while we discussed the most recent problems in the world. We realized that we hadn't quite solved all the world's problems the last time we talked.

On Thursday morning, I finished up the last bit of planing and sanding, whisk broomed the wall and scaffolds to get rid of the chips and dust, and then sprayed on two applications of Board Defense. By that time it was 11:00 and I was in a rush. I had to leave fairly early in order to stop at Charles' on the way home to get some vegetables. I wanted to get at least one coat of stain on before I left.

While the logs were drying, I had an early lunch, put away the tools, closed up as much as I could, and packed up as much as I could. By the time I finished with that, the logs were dry to the touch, which is all you need in order to apply the stain. I got one coat of stain applied except for the bottom half of the sill log and the few places under the scaffold frames. I'll do those parts later after I dismantle the scaffold. I cleaned out my brush, locked up, finished packing, and left for Charles' at about 2:00.

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