Hurry Up and Slow Down While I watch what seems like the painfully slow process of my deck going up joist by joist, I keep waiting for the work to turn this magical corner and start racing towards completion. I sort of thought that would happen today, but as the old joke goes, “not so fast, Abernathy”. My new digital, app-based irrigation system was installed in a day and now works great, giving me the…
Consensus Construction I have gotten myself into a funny place…again. That funny place has to do with my deck renovation project. This is unlike any other project I have undertaken before. The fundamental reason is that I probably have too much time on my hands. Precisely speaking, I have both the time and am home-bound by COVID like we all are. That is proving to be a very expensive combination. I write 1,200 – 1,400…
Irresponsibility On Friday, I was in the second day of the administratively enforced blackout (as in total grid shut-down) from our local utility. The cause (excuse?) was the Santa Ana wind and its harsh dry gusts that could easily induce a wildfire that could quickly get out of control and create a liability for said utility. I had had the foresight to anticipate the possibility of this situation earlier in the year and put my…
Stop and Listen to the Wind This is a strange day in a constantly strange year. What is making this day so much more strange is that I was awoken at 6am, somewhat earlier than normal given that I was up until 11:45pm watching Brian Williams trying to once again recap the strangeness of the day yesterday in the news. The reason I woke up early was that I heard a strange sound that I…
Occupying the Suitcase We are on our first road trip (or any trip for that matter) since July. That was four months ago. For years during my active working life, I had a private view that it was important to plan some sort of getaway every two months. Of course, that was in addition to weekends in Ithaca, business trips to here or there and nights out. I mean I would plan something “special” to…
The Heirarchy of the Jungle The lion sleeps tonight, but the boss man is ever-vigilant. Despite yesterday being Thanksgiving, that’s a distant memory on this particular hilltop. Strangely enough, I am not talking about myself as the boss man. I have delegated boss man status to Handy Brad and wasn’t altogether certain he would assume the mantle of responsibility, but he has done so and more. We are at full strength today with Handy Brad,…
Deck The Halls and Haul The Deck Did I mention that I am playing contractor on my deck renovation? Even if I did, I need to howl at the moon over this and so this story is what comes out. Long ago I thought I wanted to be an architect. That morphed into wanting to be a structural engineer, which evolved into an engineer more broadly, and that drifted based on a nasty run-in with…
Nothing But Blue Skies This crazy sun keeps me guessing. I’ve lived here now full-time for ten months and I am still amazed when I go to different parts of my property how the sun is in places where I don’t expect it. Part of that is about me and my orienteering capabilities while on my property and part of it is about the full range of motion that the sun (I guess I should…
The Heat Is On So far this year I have written about 325 blog stories. I used to write more than one per day (especially on weekends) but I have mostly stopped that practice because I don’t want to wear myself out. Obviously, writing is not physically demanding, but there really is only so much in the tank to say and I neither want to churn out really shitty prose nor overdo it to the…
Electrical Connections From the youngest age we are trained to be wary of electricity, and yet it is truly ubiquitous, surrounding us in our homes and cars. You cannot go very far without encountering electricity. As naturally beautiful as my hilltop out here may be, if I stop to think about it, I am dependent on electricity in every corner of my new world. Out in the Cecil Garden I have an electric fountain that…