March 12
technical
The timber arrived just after sun-up this morning. The first shipment = 53,000 pounds. There will be another truckload in about two weeks. This wood will be used for lintels that fit above each door and window, beams that support the roof structure and will be exposed in the ceiling, posts for the front porch and the side porch on the West Side, and corbels. These big pieces of pine came from a saw mill in Espanola, New Mexico.
The job today is to remove the timber from the truck and place it up the road on the ground across from the building site. To do this, Steve gets out the trusty back-hoe (remember the Earth Mover breaking ground back at the beginning of this saga? Well, now it is a Timber Mover!), puts on the special timber-moving attachment, and turns into Ripley again. During this entire process, only two pieces of wood hit the ground and they only fell a few feet and were not damaged. At some points, Steve was hauling two tons of timber using this back-hoe. Three men on the truck and Steve, the back-hoe, and his trusty side-kick were all it took to move this pile of beautiful pine timber from Point A to Point B–in about 3 hours.
This story starts with the Martini Shots. Bella, Niles, and I were at the site just as the sun was rising–a first for us!
- First sunrise
- Facing west
- It’s too bright to try to capture the sunrise in the east.
- The west turns pink and violet
- This light is so different from what we usually see up here!
- The “I can lift 2 tons of timber” attachment!
- Ready for action!
- Getting started
- First load
- Posts for the porches
- 53K pounds of wood!
- These big pieces will be cut into lintels and corbels
- A delicate process
- Steve is one with the machine
- Beams
- The men on the truck help move the pieces into place
- Porch posts
- Ah, that new wood smell!
- 16 tons and what do you get?
- Timber is placed across the road from the building site
- Only one man to help offload the timber!
- Bella is thinking she would like to gnaw on this stuff!
- Beams
- Beams for the ceiling
- Porch posts
- Last load
- Done!
- Bye Bye Mr. Jimmy, the truck driving man who sings like Tennessee Ernie Ford!
- Still sappy
- Oh and here’s the house! 😉