5/28-30/13 I went up to Camp Serendipity for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

On the way, I stopped in and visited with Uncle Charles and then stayed to have lunch with him. As a result I didn't arrive at Camp Serendipity until 2:20. I had quite a bit of stuff with me so before I moved in, I drove the truck up to the cabin so I could unload it.

Even though both Bert and Ernie had been there to greet me, Ernie did not have the patience to wait for me to get into the cabin, so Bert got all the hugs and biscuits.

One of the first things I noticed was the swarms of carpenter ants on the lower front porch steps and on the south side of the porch deck. I had set a lot of ant bait traps out inside the cabin and there was no visible ant activity inside now. There were a lot of dead ants lying around on the floor, though, so I figured that the traps had done their job in there over the weekend. I took several of the bait traps outside and set them on the front porch and the steps where there were a lot of ants. Hopefully that will take care of them.

Next, I unloaded the things from the truck and then backed the truck down to its parking place and set the electronic rodent repeller under the hood to keep the packrats out.

Back in the cabin I was surprised and dismayed when I went into the loft. It felt super warm and muggy up there. I felt the log walls, the log columns, and the visqueen on the ceiling and they were all wet to the touch. The relative humidity, as measured by a meter hanging on the Grid D2 PSL was showing 87%. The relative humidity out on the front porch was 50%. That was hard for me to understand.

The only thing I could figure out was that since I could see that there had been a lot of rain lately, the humidity outside must have been very high outside overnight. The thermostats in the cabin had been left at 52º so the loft must have been filled with damp cold air. Then in the middle of the day, the sun had warmed the cabin up and the warm air had risen to the loft. That would raise the relative humidity because warm air can't hold as much moisture as cold air. And since the air would warm up faster than the logs and the ceiling, the result would be condensation on the log and plastic surfaces. At least that is an explanation that makes some sort of sense to me.

To fix the problem right away, I set the thermostats up to 62º, opened both loft windows, and turned on the loft exhaust fan. I also went into the crawlspace to switch the ventilation valve to summertime mode so that the air exhausts to the outside instead of into the bedroom. I also decided that I should leave the thermostats set higher when I leave. It will cost a little more but if it will avoid condensation, it will be worth it.

I went to work outside and skidded one log from in front of the cabin up to the rack and placed it in the rack. About that time, I got a call from Paula asking for some help with a geometry problem for Alaina. I did my best explaining my answer.

Afterward, I went back up to the loft and was pleased that all the logs and visqueen were dry, the relative humidity was down to 67%, and it felt a lot more comfortable up there. I closed the loft windows.

Back outside, I skidded 3 or 4 more logs up the hill to the rack. One of them was too big for me to skid by hand so I rigged a long log chain from a tree by the woodshed and stretched it down to the log rack. Then with a come-along and a couple more chains, I choked the big log and skidded it up the hill.

Then I removed the long log chain and fastened it to the cabin wall logs at Grid A1 so that I could pull the big log the other way up over and onto the log rack, again using the come-along. It worked slick. I was able to skid one end of the log up onto the rack using a 2x4 as a ramp and a short 4x4 as a mast to hold up the come-along cable. I was able to get the end of the log up onto the rack of logs and then pull it all the way across.

On Wednesday I started out by retrieving and rolling up the hose that was running down the hill to the site of the now-lost giant sequoia named Chuck. The hose will no longer be needed there since the tree has disappeared.

I rolled the hose up, stored one section of it in the crawl space and took the other section with me into the sequoia grove when I went in to fertilize the tree named Dave. The plan was to see whether or not there was enough head pressure to be able to water Brian directly from a hose.

I hooked up the hoses and then fertilized Dave. By the time I finished, water was flowing out of the end of the new hose section. I unrolled the hose as I went up the trail to Brian to see how far up I could go before the water quit flowing. To my delight, there was enough pressure so that water was still flowing out even above Brian. I put the end of the hose into the drainage ditch I had dug and watched as the water gently pooled in the ditch and then made its way slowly down to the basin I had dug around Brian. That was wonderful. I can now water Brian without having to go into the woods at all. I simply have to open a valve on the front porch and let it run for a half hour or so. That might make the difference between survival of the tree and not.

Returning to work on the logs, I finished skidding all the logs from in front of the cabin and stacking them on the rack. There is still a big slab to move, but I will store that under the front porch to keep it dry. It will be used either as stair treads or as part of the front porch stoop when I get around to building those. I took a picture of the log rack with its load of logs.

After having my lunch, I called Moonlight Tile & Stone to make sure things were ready for the measurement visit in a couple weeks. I also wanted to confirm the sink order. They told me that I needed to come in and select a remnant for the lavatory. I agreed to go down there in the morning.

After the phone call, I took a short nap. Then I went to work and hung the hall closet door. After I cleaned up the mess, I counted the cabinet doors and drawers and learned that I need 17 knobs and 9 pulls.

On Thursday morning I fertilized Cam, the last of the giant sequoias, and watered Brian using the new hose setup. I also installed a wye at the hose joint so that I can fill buckets in the usual way in order to water the other trees and still be able to water Brian with the end of the hose.

Back in the cabin I set the thermostats down to 58º. We'll see in the coming weeks whether that will prevent the condensation problem or whether I will need to raise it even higher.

I packed up to leave and left for Moonlight Tile & Stone at about 11:00. When I got there, I selected a nice greenish piece of granite for the bathroom lavatory, finalized the sink order, and had a discussion with Joe about the cabinet construction I will have to do before the countertops are installed. I will have to cut the slot in the log wall to receive the stone and I will have to frame in the support for the back of the corner cabinet unit. I left for home just before noon realizing that I had quite a bit of work to do before the week after next when Bob will be out to make the measurements.

In the evening at home, when I was getting ready for bed, I noticed an unusual bump right under my waist band. Ellen looked at it and it looked like a small black dot. She got some magnifying glasses for a closer look and saw that it was the back two thirds of a tick that was embedded in my skin. After discussing what to do, she started pulling on the tick with a tweezers. In the process, the body of the tick broke up leaving parts of it inside. She then went to work with a needle and got most of it out. There was only a small black dot remaining.

6/31/13 I saw a dermatologist who took the rest of the tick out and sent it to a laboratory for analysis. I started a round of antibiotics just in case the tick was infected. After doing some research, we think the tick was a tick larva or nymph because it was so small and because its body was not very tough like an adult tick's body is. It must have gotten into my clothes and then found its way to my abdomen before digging in. I'll try to be more careful and watchful for ticks from now on. So much for tick talk.