517

It wasn’t just the strength of the overhanging trusses that was put to the test today, it was my whole credibility as a constructor.

It took me less time than expected to scramble up there. Oh man, that self timer seemed to take forever.

I felt gross all morning then started feeling better in the afternoon and had a fine afternoon at it. I loved it and felt like I wanted to work forever. Evening plans beckoned though.

I put the dreaded spirit level to the frame, with predictably disappointing results. Then I wedged some bits of wood into place with much force to push the structure closer to vertical. That improved things.

I put all the dwangs in, and about 1 and a half sides of diagonal bracing.

Bill Dowle reckoned that having massive great eves would be quite a hazard when the Canterbury winds rip through, so maybe I’ll abandon that idea of having metres of overhang. He also talked about some silicone spray stuff to water seal the bricks. I’m sure that will be expensive but it might be needed.

I was really pleased to find a use for all of the nails I have bent and discarded. By drilling the holes for the dwangs I was able to whack them in bend or no bend.

Fun fun today.

517

Right well the wooden part of the roof is done now. An interesting day for me, I felt gross for a lot of the early part of it, slept twice, then felt really good from about 4 onwards.

I became a bit puzzled at the end of the day when I slung a couple of sheets of roofing iron on. I have the right number of iron pieces, but they are too long. I was going to cut them back to an appropriate length, but I started wondering about leaving them long.

It made a really cool overhang, and would protect the bricks really well. I could dig some pillars into the ground to support this extra overhang. I’m annoyed because it is going to take me a while to work out what I’m going to do here. I don’t want to think I just want to build tomorrow.

I found some metal stuff that I can use as a diagonal brace. It will tighten things up nicely. Maybe I need to put braces on the roof and on the walls. The whole thing looks really big to me now.

I had some good times banging on the structure with the sledgehammer. It was really satisfying feeling the nails go in fast courtesy of the big mass, and knocking the structure into shape.

517

I got a bit done today. For unknown reasons I got into a heated state of annoyance out there today. I think someone might have slipped a pack of RubberNails™ in there. Paul? I was belting those things with less success than more. Oh yeah, I managed to accidentally break the screen of my camera too, not really in the heat of my anger, but I was still probably in a bit of a reckless uncoordinated state.

The final truss now sits, but it is not fully braced yet. I bought the black paper I need and a box of brick ties. Bunnings tried to shaft me on price this time, but I was onto them. Luke has managed to source me 4 bales of batts offcuts – awesome!

517

Truss off. I’m sick of you weasels.

A pretty good day. I didn’t feel at full speed but I managed to make some good progress today. I made a truss, fitted some purlons, and attached a truss. Maybe I completed the bracing between the other trusses too, but I can’t remember if that was today or earlier.

It shouldn’t be too difficult to finish the whole wooden component of the roof in about 2 hours tomorrow morning. Maybe then I’ll tack some of the iron on just to see what it looks like. Yeah, that would make sense, tack the iron on or rip it to length now. I need to buy some paper stuff to put under the iron, I’ll do that on a trip to Chch tomorrow evening.

I’m going to get a bit revolutionary and set some local time targets:

29 December - roof on
30 December – floor down (first night in shack?)
1 January – first bricks laid

Hmm. It is likely to take a day or 2 slower than that actually, there are some fun people around just now.

Nathan Jones stopped by today. Are you going to get a motorbike? Yeah.

517

So I did go a bit hard. I’ve done a little bit over the last 3 days, but no more than and hour and a half total. I’ve been feeling a lot better towards the end of today though so hopefully I can hit it again tomorrow.

I finished up today after sunset today in a light warm rain, it was just beautiful to be a part of.

517

My hands are covered in cuts, scrapes, and splinters. The surface feels sore. Does this mean that I have office hands and I just need to get hard?

I got the remaining trusses up pretty easily. The next task was to put bracing between the trusses, what the corrugated iron will nail onto. But before I could do that I needed to know exactly where they would sit. I headed to Justin’s house to pick up the roof cap he had. Due to the length of the shack I needed 2 more so I bought them from the Auction Rooms for $12 a pop. My car/ute fatted them in there easily. I also bought some roofing nails.

Paul, Simon, and others stopped by for a while to teach Simon’s sister to drive a manual out in the paddock. Paul and I laboured away in the beautiful still Canterbury heat, enviously viewing the fun paddock racing. Not really enviously, my enjoyment of working on this project remains. I did hanker for a spot of paddock racing though.

I sunscreened up today, but I still got burned. My legs are showing the worst of it, but I don’t think it is so severe as to impede sleep. I’ll need to be more careful tomorrow.

MC Hammer provided some background support today.

We got one section braced up, and I proceeded to cut all the bits for the remaining sections. This was a good achievement, I normally get bored with cutting and want to do some nailing, but those lads suggested they might return, and nailing was a good easy job when done with more than 1 person.

I was leaving the 2 overhanging trusses till last because I was still working out how I was going to do them. Because I am going to have about 1m overhang, and non-traditional purlons, I decided that I do need trusses out there. I think I can reason that out with you, Justin. I managed to finish 1 of the 2 trusses, so tomorrow’s tasks in order are: build the other truss; brace all the trusses; fit the purlons that will hold the overhanging trusses; fit and brace the 2 overhanging trusses; and fit a perimeter board. I’ll then be ready to put the iron on the roof, but I may need to rip that to length.

I had hopes of getting the roof on today, but I was unrealistic about how long things would take and didn’t get there.

I started about 8 this morning and finished about 6 this evening. There were breaks – I didn’t work right through, but I was really done when I stopped. I pushed the limits of my capabilities today.

I don't know how long the Post date and time has been out, annoying. I manually changed this one.

517

So a 3 o’clock lights out it was. And I have dominated today. I’m on such a hot health streak right now, it makes me think maybe I’m back. I’ve thought that before though so I have to just pace myself.

In a revolutionary move I placed a portable stereo out on the worksite today. This was rather than have the stereo blaring from out of the garage, on windless days possibly entertaining the whole Sefton / Mt Grey Downs area. Well. Maybe just the neighbours. I don’t know if they can hear it, maybe they can in which case it would be annoying, music you are aware of but can’t hear well is not pleasant. Ray Charles and Huey Lewis and the News provided the entertainment. Ray was awesome. Huey, not so much. Is it really hip to be square? Probably a good building motto. Not one I’ve cared too much about. Hip to be close enough.

I finished the 5 trusses for the inside of the shack. Paul and Simon Bisseker turned up at a good time. What? They were just in time to put the trusses onto the roof. Say that again? Before we could do that though we needed to pull the walls into alignment with each other. The bent wood meant that they were pretty stubbornly separated.

We wound the snot out of the clamp which pulled them into shape. Until I used the saw blade to brace it, the clamp was just chewing a hole into the wood. It was really satisfying to see the walls come flush.

We then had some pretty serious dramas with the Cyclone straps, thanks for recommending them Justin, thanks a lot. The way I had thought they were supposed to fold was wrong. We learned this after we’d folded all of them. I still didn’t know how they were supposed to fit, so on each application I’d ask which way they were supposed to fit.



The first truss was pretty straight I think, but the top plate wasn’t. Getting someone to hang on the end of the truss bent it nicely. Hang that way.



With some seriously ugly nailing we managed to get 2 of the trusses to grip pretty well.

Thanks for coming out today guys, it was a big help.

517

I completed the most part of 3 trusses today. With a combination of gangs and regular nails, these things are strong, holding together nicely. But they are man ugly. I only realised late in the piece that some of them are going to be visible from inside the shack. I’ve just haphazardly cut the bracing pieces at whatever angles I please. They are like bad teeth. I do love bad teeth though.

I bought some more gangs and some cyclone straps at Mitre 10 in Rangers. Not my best shopping experience ever. So slow.

I’m on track for a 2.30 a.m. go to bed here today, after some very enjoyable cards. This means I’m likely to be out of action though for a couple of days. I think I can still have the roof on this week though.

517

Thwarted by the rain again. I would have done some more work on my first truss but it's cold and wet outside. Tomorrow.

517

I did some more measuring of the iron today, I’m going to have plenty. I need to do some trig to work out what lengths I need to rip the iron to and how long I need to make my trusses.

I bought some gang nails but they are so small they should be called ga nails or just g nails. They were only $0.36 each though so that was good deals.

Many members of the wider Ferris family stopped by to take a look at things. We made a few bricks. We then had a game of tennis which was so fun, but that emptied my tank, and that was my day.

513

I got back on the brick making horse today. I finished off the last of the leftover concrete mix and made 19 bricks. I couldn't remember what my ratios were supposed to be so I won't be surprised if these bricks aren't very good.

I suppose I was crassing a bit because the next step, the trusses, is a bit tricky. For the last while, with the exception of the door and the window fitting, I felt like I've known what I had to do, and didn't need to think much about it. But these trusses are tricky. Justin took a look at my plans and made some useful comments. I spent a good length of time sitting in the ceiling of the garage just looking at the trusses there to see how they are done. I need 40 tough nails for a gang.

Dave Hodgkinson stopped by and enjoyed the progress I've made. He carved an inscription into a brick too. How was that, eh!!

My first task tomorrow will be to finish measuring up Rupert Fingiron to see where I have to put the nails and what my useable lengths are. For reasons unknown my recent high levels of excitement with shack building and life in general have departed me. I hope they come back tomorrow.

494

I’m blaming it on bent timbers. My tools were fine.

Today was so good I didn’t want to stop. It was getting dark though and I was at a natural conclusion. This right now is as high as I’ve been about this project, genuinely loved it today.



The shack has structure! Awesome. The timber frame walls are up, and tacked together. There were some pretty serious discrepancies in terms of corner alignment, but the wood really was bent. I managed to brutus it back into some kind of line. I don’t think it matters.



I did manage to work out how I was going to do the door, and I spent a good length of time looking at a working door to make sure I’ve got things sorted.

The window seems higher than I’d anticipated.

Steve Jourdain tagged in to help me lift the walls into position. I would have struggled by myself for sure. I took the best time lapse of us putting the walls up which I'd like to put on here, but with my dialup just registering a new pb of 3 bytes per day, there's no way I'm going to get it on from here.

Blimmin anything could happen tomorrow. Next tasks: horizontally brace the walls, I’ll see if I need diagonal ones too; lay the floor, with all that that entails; build the trusses for the roof; assemble the roof. Maybe I need to do the roof before I do the floor. I really don’t want the floor getting wet.

I love summer.

494

Another really solid day. Things didn’t really go to plan as I appreciated I probably needed to put the walls up before I could put the floor down. I rigged up the thing that will hold the window, I think it will work.

I then turned my attention to the door, and this really confused me. I’m not sure whether I should align the door with the frame or with the layer of bricks. I puzzled on this for a while and couldn’t come up with a clear answer so I’ll sleep on it and hopefully come up with something tomorrow.

I got some of the concrete bricks out and lined them up so that I could see where the door should go. Didn’t help.

The powers held strong again today, then I went and romped around at tennis as if there was nothing wrong with me, and loved it. Boy I hope my body doesn’t punish me for this, I’m on a hot streak.

Window holding device. I'm pretty sure it is squarer than it looks. Note potato plants in background.

494

What a dominating day of shack building, maybe the best I’ve done. I put all of the studs into 2 of the walls, prepared the joist reinforcing, then cut the flooring timbers to length.

If it is fine tomorrow I’ll get the floor down I reckon. The tarps that I’ve been using to cover the flooring timbers aren’t very good, no matter how well I seem to cover the wood, rain gets in. This is a bit of a concern because once I get that floor down I don’t want rain getting at it and through it, and it will be some time before I get the roof on to cover it. I may need to rig up something using the corrugated iron.

I had the cricket blazing which was just a good sideline piece of interest while I worked. (Day 5 NZ v Pakistan 3rd test at McLean Park, ending in a rained-out draw)

494

My powers remain fickle. Hence the dirty great storm which has rocked up during a time of great productivity was not appreciated for the break it caused. It was appreciated for its stormness though.

The last 4 days have seen 2 days of bad weather and 2 days of feeling gross so I haven’t got much done. I’ve got all of my flooring timbers sorted, but I’m yet to cut them to length.

I got very excited about the application of some MSCI techniques to minimise the wastage caused by cutting the flooring timbers to length, and also to find where I should place my joists. I think I could have used some kind of cutting stock algorithm but in the end I settled for a heuristic technique which is pretty good. I was spending too much time thinking about it, and I’m sure I could have got closer to some sort of optimal solution but it was time to take action.

494

Shack on!

Some kind of life this one. A brief summary of my year – I battled at my job in Wellington due to ongoing illness until the end of May. I took some time out to relax and get well, I’ve been saying it was about 4 months but I’m not really sure. During this time, to the best of my powers, I worked on the shack. While I didn’t get well during this time, I think I did get a bit better.

I wasn’t really sure what I was going to do with myself in the near future and was scared I wouldn’t have the capability to be employed again, due to the sickness. I wasn’t really looking for a job, but spotted one that looked ok, and it was only for about 6 or 7 weeks. I was pretty sure that if I really looked after myself I’d be able to last in this job, given the short duration. It was kind of a testing time, to see what capabilities I really had – I wasn’t sure.

And I handled it fine! In fact I really liked it. I’m back there next year too. So I am on a Christmas break now that lasts for near on 2 months. My some kind of life line was an expression of the puzzling nature of things, given the year I’ve had, I don’t really need 2 months holiday just now.

I’ve contemplated getting another job for this time. But I really need to get this shack finished, and this is my window. I haven’t done much work on the shack during this work time as I’ve been trying to look after myself.

So, today is the first day of my break and it has been one well used. Paul came out and provided some great help and motivation to get at it. We made the outlines of the walls, threw some axes, and invented a cool new dice game.

Due to skateboarding commitments Paul made his exit. I managed to cut out most of the rest of the vertical wall members, and even sourced some floor wood! This is really happening now.

I’ve got people coming for dinner tomorrow. The house is a mess. Eliminating the mess is going to take up to an hour tomorrow, and that is unfortunate. If things went really well, I think that there is a chance of getting the floor down tomorrow. The grooming of the floor is going to be fun too – planing it then sanding it and oiling it. I had a bit of a practice on one of the floor woods to make sure it wasn’t rimu and it came up nicely.

Some of the alignment of the walls is pretty sloppy. I don’t even care. I’ve got buckled wood as my excuse. And I know once it is all bound together it will be real solid.

So much enthusiasm for this project right now. I can’t wait until tomorrow. I’ve got to be finished by February 3. I shall consider this a goal.

494

I rigged up an ugly-structure to protect my pile of sand from the light hearted trampling of the lambs. Belatedly. But not too late.

Finished cutting the flooring members to length, and laid some practice floor on top of the members to see what it was like. It was good. Unfortunately, when I dug into my pile of would be flooring timbers, most of them were rotten, the result of years of outdoor storage. Unfortunate. I’ll need to come up with a new plan for the floor.

I feel sick in the guts courtesy of about 8 mini hashbrowns smeared in tartare sauce earlier on. I intended them as a snack only, I’ll rustle up a salad now I think. Sick in the guts having been said, I’m pretty pleased to have put in an hour or so in the evening after work.

494

Woo hoo! BACK INTO IT!

Today was a great wee stint, ably assisted by Paul who tagged in early in the piece. Aside from a brief game of saw tag Paul and I got on well and made good progress. Having 2 people made lifting, organising, and measuring so much easier. We drilled some holes, and attached the wood that will hold the floor to the foundation. We also got the bottom plates (?) ready.

I’m going to have to get things into quite a state of readiness now. There are sheep and lambs playing around and inside the shack. If I put the polythene down now, the lambs will tag it, probably the floor also. Maybe I’ll just have to wait until they are moved to another paddock.

494

Yesterday I tidied the site up a bit, moving the boxing and the stakes into the shed. Didn't take long. Today I nearly made some bricks and I also lined up some flooring timbers.

494

I awoke feeling much fresher today, and in an inspired burst managed to clear the rest of the growth layer from inside the foundation. I just loved digging today.

494

Another small nibble.

494

My poor run of health continues. I tried to do what I could today, digging the grass layer off the inside of the foundation. I didn't last very long. If I keep nibbling at it like that though it will get done.

494

Well, it wasn’t much but it was a return to work on the shack today. I’ve been bad sick for a week and a half so have been taking it easy. I felt the powers start to return today. I chipped away the concrete that leaked into my ventilation holes, and also reassembled the sheep yards that I’d destroyed earlier for boxing.

494

I could see the rain coming but it did not deter me
The cotton shirt became a part of my skin,

cold and gross as a paua.

I’m up to a total of 50 of the concrete bricks. They are so good, they feel so solid and waterproof. I’ve got enough for a whole bottom layer, and I’ll put the rest on the southern sides.

474

Mostly this post is just an excuse to put up a clip and an image extracted from a clip from Saturday.

I bought a door and the best gross window you'll see for a total of $20. I also started having thoughts about pink batts and a floor.

474

Taking the boxing off was neither fun nor easy. I think I got a bit hungry too, trying to reclaim the low boxing rather than just leaving it be. I really want to be finished inside 2 months, and I’m going to try and work to that now.

465

20 concrete bricks. I just might have enough!

445

You’ll be surprised. And I was.

We were all done by 10:41. Awesome. With a big crowd at it, we ripped out the filling of the foundation real fast. The boxing held – sort of. There was one point where things went a bit ashtray, and we made some hasty repairs.

At one point I looked around at the people who were helping and knew that they all were very careful people, who would make things to exact specifications. I made the call “I’m the only person here who would be happy with the quality of this foundation.” Paul Peterson claimed he’d be happy with it too. This made me feel better.

To be honest, I’m not really happy with it – but it will do. I expect that it will perform perfectly adequately, but it is not flush. In order to make a better job of it I would have needed to make the boxing much tighter. And that would have cost money – I used the materials I had on hand, but they weren’t great. The stakes weren’t great, and some of the boxing was buckled. It will do.

I really enjoyed it today, having heaps of people round, in good spirits, working on a common task. Thanks for coming guys, I appreciate it. Mum bought some tea and pikelets out near the end which were appreciated.

I made one brick with the tover concrete, and it looks real good. There is a bit of aggregate tover, and a bag and a half of cement. I reckon I might make this into bricks. Hopefully there will be enough for 40 odd, cause then I will use them to make a layer of bricks at the bottom of the structure, touching the foundation. Concrete bricks will be waterproof, and I reckon that will be a good feature. If there is moisture inside the structure, it will pool down on the foundation before leaking out between a gap in the bricks. Hence if this part was waterproof, it would be better.

444

Dave came around early and we assembled the reinforcing. Later on, at Dave's instruction, I smacked a few more stakes in. I also fitted 4 pipes for ventilation - I hope you're happy now Justin.

I had planned to make a few bricks too, but it started to rain. I don't know whether the rain will have an effect on our concrete laying tomorrow, if it continues.

Dave and I made a small mistake fixing the stirrups to the reinforcing rods. I think I enjoyed it more than he did.

444

The foundation has been boxed. Leighton stopped by and dropped off some more boxing, and some stakes. I got a couple of pieces of boxing up by myself early on but it was tough going, and I soon became frustrated. Dave stopped by, and with two of us at it it was much easier. When Dave left I banged the bracing stakes back in (we’d pulled them out because they were in the way) and pulled the boxing into line.

If you fire a nail gun and the wood splits, the nail will travel further than it would otherwise. It your finger is there, the nail will cut it.

Dave regularly tripping over the reasonably visible fence wires provided some entertainment today.

428

Dave came round and helped me and showed me how to put the boxing up. The nail gun is amazing. I don't know how I ever did anything without it. Dave left the gun with me, I've got more boxing to put up tomorrow. He reckons there is a lot of work to do to be ready for concreting on Saturday.

420

16 partial bricks. I cut and banged in the remaining pegs.

Bolts to attach the floor and walls to the concrete foundation were an alarming $3-$4 each, and I need about 40 of them. I think I'll need to come up with a new way of doing this.

Plundering the farm’s infrastructure proved to be a successful method of supplementing the supply of boxing materials. I’ll put them back Mum.

404

I banged some more pegs in today, tomorrow I need to make 26 more pegs then figure out what boards I'll use for the boxing.

Things are getting ready for the foundation laying Saturday. Dave Peach is going to give me a hand on Wednesday tidying up the boxing. Dave is going to bring his concrete mixer on Saturday. Leighton Baker, Aaron Fisher, and Justin McCartney have also intimated that they will be in attendance. Good times.

404

Day 6 in a row, woohoo! I didn’t sleep particularly well and that concerned me, as I knew I had a big day ahead of me, and an early start. But I was at it just before 8, unheard of early hours for me in my recent state of health. I had a mid afternoon sleep, but other than that charged today.

Due to the fact that I now had a double axle trailer, they were able to put a full cubic metre of mix on. I had been anticipating 2 trips, but it only took 1.

I then headed to Rangers to get some cash out before heading to Paul King’s for some roofing iron. I had a nice coffee with him and Sam there before leaving $130 lighter, but all the iron I’ll need heavier. A fun development was the spotting of some clear corrugated plastic, which will be excellent for increasing the natural light inside the shack.

At Paul’s recommendation I then headed to Select Reinforcing where Wayne gave me what he assured me was an amazing price on some steel reinforcing, while Kevin cut and bent it for me. I’m really starting to feel a lot of excitement about the project now, as everything starts to come together.

I returned the trailer to Amberley and the nice guy charged me $55 for the additional trailer hire, and the cost of repairs to the other one. I’ve gotten out of this pretty well I think. They were fixing the one I messed up yesterday while I was there, it had a drip in its arm, and was looking in a pretty sorry state. Apologies.

The Ravensdown fertiliser bags have been awarded a grade a notch just above useless for their role in transporting the sand from Kate MacPherson’s house back here. They split and made a mess while under light loadings, certainly not the 40kg that are marked on them. I don’t know how they got here, maybe they are seconds.

Kate had some old sand that was left over from some concreting work that she had done. I was able to cart this away, as well as a bag and a half of cement. Cheers Kate, appreciated.

I went back down to the first offal quarry and collected a barrow load of rocks, I reckon these might be useful for putting at the bottom of the trench prior to pouring the concrete. I’ll see what my advisors recommend though.

Thanks to all involved today, I’ve been helped out by a lot of people, and it has been a real good experience.

Below: Kate’s Laser riding low, laden with bags of sand, and Ravensdown fertilizer “bags” making a mess.

404

A drama filled day. I had aspirations of an early start and a full day of work. I was up at 8, but at 9 I was back in bed. I wasn’t feeling great, and as I’m doing at the moment, I am prepared to rest when I need to.

So, I resumed slightly after 12. It turns out that the trailer I was to borrow wasn’t registered, so I headed off to Amberley Hire. I there incurred my first expenses of this project - $15 for a half day hire. I intend to have a separate page linked to this blog which tracks my expenses – I’ll get onto that.

The first trailer journey with 0.5m^3 of 19mm premixed sand and stones ($20 a load) was uneventful. I hadn’t really known how long the process of getting a load, driving home, unloading it and returning was going to take. Hence I started becoming aware that I was running out of time. I reckon the whole process took a bit over an hour for one load, and I needed to push things a bit if I was going to get done in time.

So, on the second journey I was pushing things a little bit, but not driving silly fast. I was going about 60km/h I reckon, on a gravel road, when the trailer starts sliding around behind me. It wasn’t long before the trailer had knifed and I slid to a halt, car and trailer sprawling all over the road. Part of the trailer was ruined, and there was a small mark on the borrowed car. I think I got out of this one pretty well.

I returned to Amberley Hire where the guys were awesome about it, they are going to charge me about $30 I think for a new piece of metal which they will weld in. They gave me a new trailer with tandem wheels.

So, I got 3 loads today, amounting to about 1.5m^3. I think I’ll get another 2 loads tomorrow morning, as well as hopefully some corrugated iron for the roof, some windows, a door, and some rebar for the foundation.

Raking the gravel off the trailer took a bit out of me, so once again at the end of the day I’m nicely done. I think that is 5 days in a row without a sickness crash, good times.

404

I dug a trailer load of clay, which took me a long time but will keep me supplied for a good while.

I foraged for old little bits of wood to act as stakes, and banged about 30 of these in, they will hold the boxing. I reckon I need about 30 or 40 more.

I feel nicely tired at the end of today. I'm excited about resuming tomorrow, provided my health holds for a 4th straight day.

404

An early start yielded 21 half bricks and 1 full brick. I loosened the wires on the fence and pegged them down so now there is uninhibited access to the site.

382

Things got exciting today. In the process of harvesting clay I was attacked by the nemesis birds. I was better armed than I have been in the past, with a heavy shovel as a weapon. They didn’t get too close to me, there was only one swooping too. I returned later on with my camera and tried to provoke them so that I could get some good swoop footage but I mustn’t have been in the right place because they just squawked at me.

I called up Dave Peach to give me a hand getting everything squared up ready for the boxing. In a most useful session we banged in some pegs, raised some bits of wood at the correct level, and strung up where the boxing will go. It was quite dramatic the difference in height of the ground, the ground does look to be on a slight slope, but it was more than I had thought. I think the following Saturday will be the time to pour the concrete. I learnt some stuff today, and that was good.

382

I widened the trenches a bit, to accommodate the stakes and the boxing. I’m not exactly sure how I can make it square, I think I could make up the boxing for each of the 4 sides then move them around until they are square. No, having 4 corner stakes would be better, then attach the boxing to them. Yeah.

I’ll have a towball car and trailer this week, so I’ll be able to get the mix that will make the concrete. Tentatively lining up next Saturday as foundation pouring day. We’ll see.

382

Numbering is going to get a bit misleading now. Today I made some partial bricks. I'm not sure why I was so averse to the idea of making different sized bricks and having different patterns of bricks in a wall, which is what these partial bricks will do. They will make functional, good walls, but they won't be perfect. That's ok though.

354 + most of foundation dug

Some heavy overnight rain made for excellent digging conditions. Now after some tidying up to square and depth, I'll be able to put in the BOXING.

354 + some foundation dug

Who would have thought that maths would have some application. According to Pythagoras the shape of the quadrilateral that I have strung up isn’t quite rectangular, but it’s pretty close.

I decided I’d just dig out more than was needed and the rectangle I need should be in there somewhere. To be honest I just wanted to start digging, not muck round getting a string line square at this stage. I dug out one side, but not to proper depth yet.

The dirt that I extracted looked really good for growing vegetables in, a sideline interest right now. I think I’ll use that dirt to make a garden. It was surprisingly easy digging and I reckon if I stick at it I’ll be able to dig the whole perimeter tomorrow. The only concerning thing is I am taking quite a bit out, which means it will need a lot of concrete to fill. I need to buy the stones and sand for the concrete – possibly my first expenses in this project.

I laid some bricks in the shed just to check how things fit together. I think I’m going to need some 2/3 bricks, maybe 2 every 2nd layer. I’ll also need some real little ones, about 5 cm wide.

Today I tried to cook potatoes in a pile of grass clippings that had gotten wet and had started some kind of chemical reaction deep in the pile. It was so hot that I couldn't keep my hand in there. The potatoes didn't cook right through though.

I don't know why Blogger refuses to acknowledge the correctness of my double space after full stops. I'm doing it here but then when the post gets viewed it looks like I'm some kind of 1 space amateur.

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One of the bricks had a crack in it and I gave it a twist and it disintegrated.

I mowed my site and staked out a rough outline of where the shack will sit. It is so little. I hadn’t appreciated how small it was.

I established a couple of positions that I can take regular photos from.

Because I am changing the orientation of the bricks they now don’t fit so sweetly – the width is no longer half the length. This may mean that I need bricks 2/3 length. I’m laying out the bricks in the shed, and I’ll build a couple of layers high to see what my exact needs are, and what dimensions the shack will be. It is fine to sketch things on paper but things can drop out differently in reality.

The way the bricks respond to water hasn’t been particularly impressive. They just suck the water up like a mop. Maybe I will need to do some pretty severe painting of them.

Progress has been poor of late, I haven’t had a lot of interest in the project, preferring to make picture frames.

How good is this?