At the North East side, the piers are the tallest, so I decided to make an access door there.
When closed you barely see it, but it’s big enough to put my bike and anything big for permanent storage.
I re-used the hinges and latches I had on the OSB, and made a frame from old 2×4’s
Today I skirted the extension on the west side.
The left section is still removable, as that’s where the scaffolding is stored when not in use.
Last year I replaced the brake pads on my truck although that went well, I did notice that the right rear caliper wasn’t exactly moving smoothly; it took me 30 minutes to compress it.
Last time I was over (early January) I noticed the metal scraping sound when softly breaking was back. So this time I ordered a new caliper, and replaced the old one.
As you can see, the moving part completely broke off when I compressed it this time, so clearly this was the culprit.
With the new caliper in place, after bleeding the brake line and re-topping the brake fluid, the truck once again breaks well without any metal scraping sounds.
A few months after my log home logs were in place and the framing was done, I received a letter from the Colonel (owner of the Stallion Springs subdivision land) stating that I needed to get the pier and beam foundation covered up, as that’s part of the rules in this subdivision. At the time, I needed a quick and cheap solution, which was OSB boards. That did its job until now, but the boards were coming loose and moisture had made them weak. In combination with the slightly exaggerated report that Ozuye was infested with wasps, this trip I’m replacing the OSB with much more aesthetically pleasing cedar planks, a process that is known as skirting.
Above you can see the first result, with the new cedar skirt on the right and the old white OSB on the left.
It’s been here for a few months now, but I hadn’t seen it myself. This one is copper, hoping that it will last a bit longer than the previous iron ones, that had a tendency to rust away in 2 years.
I bought a bottle of local single malt whiskey from this store, aptly named whiskey business:
Besides an excellent selection of whiskey, they also had some funny T-Shirts like this one:
This wouldn’t work in Amsterdam as Beer is actually the Dutch word for Bear.
So I had to get a cedar board to replace the one on the siding. As I only needed half of it, I was left with a piece of cedar. Combine that with nice weather and my fondness of making stuff from cedar, I made this little beer caddy
It fits a six pack of bottles or cans. I’m not likely to use it myself, as my beer usually goes directly from fridge to glass to mouth. Cheers 🍻
When I installed the rain gutter, it did not come with enough kit to prevent it from leaking a little at the seams. So as it’s nice weather, I decided to setup the scaffolding and fill the gaps from the inside of the gutter with some silicone kit.
It’s much easier to do this with the scaffolding.
The old Huntington grill that Mart gave me when he visited back in 2017 has finally given up. After replacing the burner, ignition and hose in March, it just wouldn’t burn anymore now. So it was time for an upgrade.
Kept it very modest, but this one does have three burners instead of two. And a temperature gauge and a tray to keep things warm.
But it’s stainless steel only for the front plates and the tray, so we will see if this one holds up 7 years too. First test will be tonight, Christmas Eve with a nice big steak. 🥩
Update: it’s officially approved. 🤠
The floating toilet upstairs somehow got its support frame inside the wall bent. I suspect someone with more weight than is healthy managed to do so. In order to prevent it from bending even further, I gave the toilet trunk support;
I used the part I cut out of the wall to put the pellet stove outlet, as that has about the same curve as the toilet bowl. Although it’s no longer floating, it will support even the heaviest people.