The Garage!

[gbrown]

We've got SLAB!

http://www.catspaw-minerals.com/images/slab.jpg

When we get back from France in two weeks the framing should be all done!

[Lorne]

Did you put your initials and the date in it? :)

[gbrown]

They're going into the sidewalk. I'm also firing a glass tile with names and a year on it... that will get embedded in the sidewalk, too.

GcB

[John-oh]

I love all these huge North American houses, I'm from Yorkshire and I was lucky to be brought up in a hole in the ground ...

Heres some more who were equally lucky ..four-yorkshiremen-sketch.html (http://www.joep.org.uk/2006/04/four-yorkshiremen-sketch.html)
I like the Alan Rickman version.:D
Keep us posted with the progress.

[Corey]

John-oh, 98% of the houses here are not that size. Those are a couple of biggies. :)

[gbrown]

It's a Victorian... built 1901. The Dot and her Ex bought it back in 1980 or so. Back then it was split into multiple appartments. Really nasty. It's also neat in that it's on a lot and a half, which is very unusual. THe addition that pokes out the back was put on in the early 90's.

You should have seen the hoops we had to jump through to get the plans approved by the Historic District.

GcB

[Corey]

I'm considering designing a new wrestling move called, "The Victorian".

[eric_darling]

I'm considering designing a new wrestling move called, "The Victorian".
It would have to involve a corset and a jar of snake oil. Maybe some frilly adornments, too.

Yeah, I love those houses, gbrown. My office is in a 1909 victorian building, but it's hardly the gem of the neighborhood in terms of historical significance.

[gbrown]

We are right on the northern edge of the district. Accross the street you don't have do bow & scrape to The Comittee. It wouldn't bother me if they had a nicely written set of "Thou Shalt" and "Thou Shalt Not". If you get on the wrong side of one of the people, you're toast.

That said, it's great having the district... it's one of the largest in the US!

GcB

[Intrigued]

Looking good so far.

:yes

[eric_darling]

We are right on the northern edge of the district. Accross the street you don't have do bow & scrape to The Comittee. It wouldn't bother me if they had a nicely written set of "Thou Shalt" and "Thou Shalt Not". If you get on the wrong side of one of the people, you're toast.

That said, it's great having the district... it's one of the largest in the US!

GcB

I know precisely what you mean. Rules and regs coupled with absolute power are dangerous.

Savannah (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Savannah,_Georgia) has the nation's largest. On top of that, we have several smaller nationally recognized historic districts outside of downtown as well.

[gbrown]

Here's the Ramsey Hill Historic District Site (http://www.ramseyhill.org/).

GcB

[gbrown]

Wow... you go on vacation for a couple of weeks and you come back to THIS:

http://www.xmn.com/images/outside-2006-07-04.jpg

The two right-most bays will be for the cars. The left-most bay is walled off seperately and The Dot will be storing her teaching stuff in there. She has a zillion big tubs...with a couple of tubs representing one grade. Since the Minneapolis School District (in their INFINITE wisdom) keeps laying her off each year, and hiring her back at a DIFFERENT level each year, The Dot has full classroom set up for every grade from 1 through 5. Now we'll just be able to back the truck up each year and load/unload the year's classroom instead of schlepping it up and down the steps into the basement of the house. Of course, some year they might actully keep her on in the same classroom. THAT would be a treat! There will also be room in there for the exercise equipment that currently lives in the basement. But I digress...

Here's the new office space:

http://www.xmn.com/images/inside-2006-07-04.jpg

We worked our little butts over the last four days. The ready-for-rough-in-inspection wiring is around 80% complete. I've got all the lighting cans and spot lighting boxes in, and 2 out of the 3 ceiling fan mountings. You should see the size of the wire I stuck in for my 240V kilns... AWG 8!

We should be ready for the FIRST inspection this weekend.

GcB

PS. It was HOT up there this weekend. It was getting up to 90F and there is (obviously!) no insultation in yet. Lots and LOTS of water...and a BIG fan.

[Intrigued]

Ah, making some very productive headway!

Nice job Gary.

[gbrown]

Hmmm... here's a question: should I hard-wire in a bunch of network cables around the room, or just put in a nice wireless unit and receivers on each box?

GcB

[Adam]

I would hard wire the cat-5 into the walls. I just don't trust wireless and I think that wired is still faster so that is what I'd do.

Speaking of historic districts IndigoRose is located in The Exchange District (http://www.heritagewinnipeg.com/historic_exchange.htm). I think that our building is over 100 years old.

Adam Kapilik

[gbrown]

:) :yes :) :yes :)
We just passed the rough-in electrical inspection! I'll finish the cable, telephone, and network cabling tonight. The insulation should go in on Thursday, followed by rocking over the weekend.
:) :yes :) :yes :)

[Lorne]

I know I will be rocking over the weekend. :)

<insert air guitar solo here...>

[gbrown]

I know I will be rocking over the weekend. :)

<insert air guitar solo here...>

I knew it, I just knew it, I thought to myself (thought I!). SOMEONE will make some comment about the rocking....

GcB

[Adam]

ya gotta love the rock.

Put some finished pics up when its all done

AJK

[gbrown]

Framing inspection PASSED! The insulators are now shoving insulation into every available nook and cranny. I remembered at the last minute (like this morning) to pull a 5e cable over to a far wall. Scarry time now... all my wiring is getting sealed up...

GcB

[gbrown]

Think I've got enough insulation in there?

http://www.xmn.com/images/insulation.jpg

So... I pop upstairs and suddenly realize "Ooops... I didn't have the wires in the cans connected 'cause it was only rough-in electrictal. I made a journey around the ceiling and connected stuff.

They brought the sheet rock in today...by Monday the tapers (not to be confused with tapiers) should be at it... I am not going to be able to sleep decently until they hook up the power next week and I actually get to see that I did an OK job on the wiriing.

GcB

[gbrown]

Rock all in except for the gable walls (they ran out of rock!). Impressive...a van pulls up and 8 guys pile out. 4 hours later, they ran out of rock...

Here's what The Dot was up to:

http://www.xmn.com/images/out24july.jpg

She climbed UP the high ladder on the gable ends. She climbed DOWN the high ladder on the gable end. I think we'll contract that chunk out after the shakes go up in a day or so. Just too high for us old folks! :lol

Oh... and I got the pipe in from the garage to the house. 5e, TV-coax, and phone.

GcB

[Intrigued]

Gary I feel you will have some good news soon for us.

;)

[gbrown]

Houston...we have POWER! I hooked up the first breaker this evening...now the garage door openers work. "Double Yellow" on the circuit tester. :lol

I do hate opening up that box... even though I'm REAL carefull just seeing those big fat wires coming INTO the box give me the willies.

The Dot's got the primer coat on in the office/glass studio. Her storage bay is ready for storage.

:wow MOVE DATE: 3 weeks! :wow

GcB

[Intrigued]

I really like the amount of space. And that loft area for me when I come visit for free.

:p

It's looking real nice Gary. I have roofed before but the rest, well. I'd end up with a very "interesting" building if I did the work.

heh.. heh.

[Adam]

That is a pretty nice garage there buddy. I have to park my car in the snow all winter. That loft is like a treehouse, a nice little getaway.

Adam Kapilik

[Tek]

Very nice!

I worked as an electrician for 8 years back when I didn't have a bum back... I can understand your reluctance to get inside the panel... reminds me when I worked with my old man (he's an electrician and I worked for him) where he was working on a main bus panel that fed an entire industrial building. Some doofus put electrical tape on one of the phase bars and my dad had to scrape it off to tap into it. He used a metal knife to do it (to this day, I don't know why) and he accidentally dropped it. It made contact between two phases and BOOM! He was thrown back some 10 feet and suffered third degree burns to his face and lost any hair he had on this face. He did not get a shock, but the blast from the short was huge!

Be careful sir, and take care.

[gbrown]

Very nice!....

Be careful sir, and take care.
Thanks! I, too, learned wiring from my father. He was an engineer with Bell Labs for 40+ years. I guess I stripped my first wire when I was 9 or so. When I go into The Box I always have someone with me...and I ALWAYS say exactly what I'm going to do as I do it. On that note...brought up another circuit last night. At first a bit of a bother with a bad outlet, but tracing with my handy-dandy signal injector spotted it straight away. Cool tool... you clip the "sender" part onto the hot wire (breaker OFF, duh!) and go around testing the hot wire in the circuit. As long as you hear a Beep Beep Beep with the probe you're OK. When you don't, you know you've narrowed down the fault.

Yesterday we set up shelves in the small garage bay and moved around a ton (literally!) of The Dot's school stuff out there. Amazing...we actually have a living room again!

GcB

[gbrown]

Well, I'm glad I decided to check out the lights up in the office before the final bit of wood went up. One of the cans wasn't quite right. Not right as in "didn't light up". I cut back the poly liner on the ceiling, pulled back the insulation (wow, was it HOT above the insulation...and that was on the north side of the roof), popped the box on the side of the light, and discovered that I hadn't quite gotten the wire nut on one of the leads. Simple twist and all was well. It would have been a Big Thing to fix if I hadn't caught it.

Progress:

All lights are now FUNCTIONAL.
All outlets on the first floor are ACTIVE.


To Do:

Activate outlets on second floor.
Wire in kiln outlets.


We've started moving THINGS over from my house to the Dot's. I don't even want to think of how many loads.

GcB

[gbrown]

Wooo-Hooo! Sitting at the desk in the new office! AC is keeping me cool! The Dot is sorting stuff onto her shelves.

The attic of the Old House is empty.
The first floor of the Old House is empty (and is already being gutted by the New Owner).
The bottom floor ("garden level") is 80% cleaned out.

I am soooooo tired.

I've now got all these boxes marked "GB Stuff from Desk. SORT NOW!!!!!". I'll get to it over the weekend. For now, my desk is more-or-less clean.

GcB

[Intrigued]

Gary, it sounds like your I.R. avatar sums it up, with all the moving and what not.

;)

Take'er easy for a bit. Let the stress go.

*Lay flat on the ground, feet straight and together but allowed to relax*

*Arms to side, straight down, again relaxed, with palms down*

*Breath deeply and slowly, concentrating on filling your stomach not chest with air*

*Repeat the breaths 7 to 10 times, then lay still, relaxed for a few minutes* (you may fall asleep, have enough time on hand to do this exercise)
(Also, it works best after you are very tired)

Note: Each inhale and exhale should take between 10 to 25 seconds, depending on your lung capacity.

Note 2: I'm not a doctor and you should consult with a doctor before starting any fitness regiment

;)