Construction Journal Entry Week of 5/23/21

5/24-28/21 I went up to Camp Serendipity for five days: Monday through Friday.

I arrived at 10:25, brought my gear up in one trip, hoisted the flag, had a brunch, and my nap. When I got up, I was still feeling a little dizzy.

I practiced the piano and then went outside and leveled the scaffold tower. I used a come-along connected to a C-clamp attached to the top of a 2x4 which I stood vertically alongside the scaffold frame. That made it easy to crank the frame up and put higher shims under the legs.

I went into the woods and checked on Paul and the little transplanted cedar tree I call Runty.

Back in the cabin I spent some time transcribing a couple difficult passages in the music I'm trying to learn and started making an exercise sheet that was easier to read.

Earl called about bedtime and we had a nice conversation.

On Tuesday I was happy that I was not dizzy. I practiced the piano and then installed the baseboards in the bedroom closet. Then I had my lunch and a nap.

Then I went outside and used my contour strider to lay the clothesline rope on the 1815 contour. Before I finished, the mosquitoes had gotten pretty thick, and it was pretty hot. I went back in the cabin and finished writing out the piano exercise sheet.

On Wednesday I felt good again. I practiced the piano and then went back out to work on my surveying. I came up with a new method for marking the points on the clothesline that was better than just laying sticks on it. I used clothespins and wrote the point number on each clothespin. Then I just clamped the clothespin around the rope. I laid out 14 clothespins on the 1815 rope contour and then made the measurements to those points.

After lunch and a nap, I drew the 1815 contour line on my map using the data I had collected earlier. In the process it looked like an error in some of the readings, so I went back out and re-measured a few points and came back in and fixed my drawing. I spent the rest of the afternoon reading

On Thursday morning Robert called first thing to check on me. Then I practiced the piano and went outside and took in the rope and clothespins.

I went into the woods and checked on Runty and Paul and I also checked on the cedar that I had rescued from the fallen tree and I looked at some of the others. They all looked healthy.

Next, I looked at my scaffolding and figured out how to make stabilizing anchors to brace it against the building. I also went looking for some pipes that would serve as stanchions at the top of the third tier, and I was happy to find a couple.

After lunch and a nap, I built the supports to brace the tower. I used the bolts that run through the log walls that I used for scaffold anchors in the past and then used rebar tie wire to make tension members between the scaffold legs and the bolts. Then I cut short boards that just fit between the scaffold frames and the log wall to serve as compression members. Then by tightening the wires, I had two very secure sturdy anchors. It had started to rain before I finished but since I was under the eaves it didn't matter.

Robert called again to check on me and later in the evening the doorbell rang. It was Barb and Byron. They came in and we had a delightful visit. Barb had not seen the place since before I had finished the front steps so there was a lot of new work she hadn't seen. I also played a couple of pieces for them on the piano and recited part of a poem I had been working to memorize.

On Friday morning I practiced the piano, did some reading, and then left early because Ellen had the day off. It had been a good week and I was happy that the dizziness was gone. I left for home at 10:30.



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