Closing out another year

 

Proving god has a sense of humor

 

 

Going and coming sometimes seems like a dream. If I didn't have the healing scars on my face, did I actually leave? Leaving in October was risky to begin with. The hurricane season runs July through November with September and October being noteworthy. Now it is true there's really nothing I can do during a hurricane if the house were to suffer any damage but there is a lot I can do to mitigate the damage immediately afterwards. It may simply be putting a tarp over a hole in the roof. The point, not being there prompts close weather watching every few days. During the season the storms are constantly forming off of Africa/Cape Verde islands and barreling across the Atlantic. Thankfully, tiny islands are hard to hit in the vastness of the ocean. It does happen however. When it does the survivors never forget. Some peeps move. One is enough. Akin to tornadoes, I would imagine.


First chore, cleaning the mold and mildew that builds up when the house is closed for more than a month and it rains. I can do the whole house in an hour. I spray and use a sponge mop. The trim is all painted in oil so it instantly disappears. I'm currently testing paint additives. None have worked so far.

 

 

 

Poor guy. Only the second one in all these years. They are not like city rats. In a different time and place they would be a pet like a white rat that so many people have. If they ate crumbs, wore diapers and generally slept at night I probably could live with them. With Lizzy, my feral cat patrolling I just don't have any. He moved in, I was gone a month, who can blame him?

Back to the punch list. With only two months before I leave again I'll do some things that will give a sense of completion. Most of the jobs never get truly finished as I'm usually waiting for something missing. With Roger's jackhammer above it was for one of the handles. I gave up waiting and used it as it was to relocate the downstairs toilet drain. Why move the drain? Because I changed the closet and utility room dimensions by a couple of inches throwing the toilet placement to far from the wall and too close to the shower. Then I had to order a 45 degree offset flange or some such from Amazon, trans ship via SF, hammer down through 6" of concrete, make it all fit, and pray like hell that the toilet would flush properly when it was done!

Done!



 

Days like this make it all worth while.

On the way back from Cruz after returning the jackhammer to Roger.

 

 

 

The cabinet arrives, crushed a bit but undamaged. With the drain moved, I jumped upstairs to finish the cabinet installation, left since August. Made other changes also. I did not like the cabinet on top of the refrigerator. Took it down and rehung it. We had this idea that we would make everything be flush with the refrig profile but it was out of the question. The more I looked at the ginormous footprint I couldn't handle it. When we purchased our appliances counter depth refrigs were not available at reasonable prices. Compound that with my using the wrong dimension on the refrig and I had an aesthetic nightmare--self induced of course.

 

 

 

This gives you the machinations I tried to go through to have the top of the refrig be flush with the bottom of the cabinet. The frig/cabinet are forcing me to shrink the size of the arch by four inches. Like I said previously, if I could have afforded a new refrig I would have bought one to fit rather than doing all these modifications.

 



For us armchair scuba peeps, full screen mandatory

Next on the agenda teaching myself to put up the copper gutters. Back in SF I bought an "opened" Bernzomatic torch head for $20 which I brought down in my carryon along with several rolls of silver soldering. The hose and tank I bought on St Thomas.

 

 

The nozzle, along with the small 20 gallon propane tank, made the practice soldering very easy. Applying it to the gutters was a whole different story. The fun was just starting. I don't even know where to begin. Years before, yes it's been that long, the drain pipes to the cistern were each to the side of the front porch columns. I figured the downspouts would come down and with a 2" offset, disappearing into the underground pipes laid in the concrete slab. Congratulating myself that everything was on spot on I started to snap lines for the gutters. Then the problems started. To avoid the normal look of gutters draining into gutters with small downspouts, I wanted to hang them seamlessly around the premier of the house down sloping where necessary along the rooflines of the shed roof above the front door. A little more work, four corner pieces and a lot less clutter resulting in cleaner lines. Like most of our plans they sound good on paper!

 

I started with easy part.



In the pic above I simply cut a ten foot gutter piece to fit the front of the porch. The down spouts are a work in progress. Because of the fascia board, if I mounted the leader heads up closer to the gutter where I wanted them, I would then have a 1" offset problem for my downspout. (In the picture I have them under the fascia board lip creating a straight drop into the downspout--very clear in the picture below.)

 

Not liking this look. We want the catchment closer to the gutter.
Yet we want the downspout flush to the column.

They don't make custom 1" offset elbows only 2", 3" and 4". I have seen peeps hang their downspouts on an angle. We don't like that look. I'll have to come up with something. I put them up, as is, just to funnel the water into the cisterns while I think about it.

Working with copper feels really good.

 

 

Getting in touch with my inner Mexican, I mean tinsmith...;~)

Everything is getting put up for a test run before I solder everything.

In the picture below you can see the gutter on left sloping up, following the slope of porch roof I mentioned earlier. That's how we want it but it created its own problem as I was to find out.

What you don't see is my driving back to Cruz to borrow the jackhammer again. The original drains were on the outside of each column. I quickly realized that was not going to work with my gutter layout. Water would flow down the gutter with some of it passing over the downspout and then collect on the front of the porch with no place to go. Monster rains would probably cause it to overflow. Hello jackhammer. Yup, of course I ran into rebar in the slab. Just another snafu!

 

Finished....moved from the side to the front.

 

 

 With the hurricane season over I left the dry fit gutters in place on the front of the house to be soldered when I return in the new year.

 





full screen as always 

 

From the Smuggler's blues files....

 

http://stjohnsource.com/content/news/local-news/2013/10/24/coast-guard-seizes-34-million-cocaine-detains-3

 

http://virginislandsdailynews.com/news/dea-arrests-4-men-seizes-187-pounds-of-cocaine-on-st-thomas-1.1551397

 

Remember, always retire before copping a plea--this way you go to jail but keep your pension! It's the VI way....;~)

http://virginislandsdailynews.com/news/police-commissioner-angelo-hill-retired-after-arrest-1.1605032

 

A sleeper year

 

Proving once again, predicting the weather, climate etc is dart throwing at best.

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2013/20130523_hurricaneoutlook_atlantic.html

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang/wp/2013/04/16/four-groups-predict-very-active-hurricane-season/

 

 

I think most people thought these were ruins inside the park at Maho until a construction crew showed up and started a major remodel. Reporters were not able to find out what is intended. From this I arrived here the next day!

 



Under the knife

Palace of Fine Arts 

 

Just like that, I was back in SF. 

 

Left over on the original site 

from the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition

 

 

It may be the #1 wedding photo location in SF

rent-a-swans  ;~)

 

 

Looking good at 22! 

 

 

 It was a spot the size of a pencil eraser---not my death mask!

 

The reason I came home...Medicare kicked in. I knew I would need Mohs surgery. It can be vey expensive so I waited. For the Mohs's uninitiated, they cut, check the margins to see if they got it all, and then close you up. This took three tries over the course of almost seven hours. Yes, you are awake for all of it occasionally yelping when the pain medicine wears off in he middle. 



Finally the good news comes and they tell you they got it all. Then the fun begins trying to figure out where to get the skin to lose it all up. The stitches above show where they went looking.

 A week later.

 



Then there was that small spot on my nose that turned into this. Another three peat constantly taking more each time to get clean margins.

 



This one kicked my ass while it was happening. You can see it in my eyes. It was if my face/psyche could not take this much in ten days. The picture above was the half way point. To get the skin to close, they cut into my cheek and pulled over a "flap". You don't want to see that photo but if you insist it follows!



The next day....





The flap later failed and had to be removed causing a very slow healing process where the wound had to fill itself. I must have killed a lot of people in a past life for this karma. I cannot feel anything around my eye. The nerves have been temporarily damaged. Supposedly they will heal.

My daily walk



 

At the corner of Broadway and Fillmore

 

Of course we only find the tile we like here in SF. I take pictures to show vendors what I'm looking for. If I could even find it on St Thomas it would start at $25/sf making it economically not feasible.

 

Other than ordering, receiving, and transshipping to St John the missing kitchen cabinet I did nothing except cry the blues about my painful face. Would I give up the life that gave me the skin cancer? No way. Had you been there you would say the same.


 



Mount Shasta on the return  to STJ via Seattle.

 

 The Bahamas from 35,000 feet.....

 

 

Back to the shack!

 

A short return

The return to St John was uneventful. What's better than that. The truck started right up, just a little air in the tire and I was good to go. With my friend Roger letting me park at his building I simply walk off the barge a couple of island blocks and I'm at the truck. It makes the red eye more than tolerable.

Nothing had moved into the shack while I was gone. Plug everything in and it's like I never left. Bringing fresh coffee and bread on my return, as I do, the next morning I'm not even sure I really left. For the next couple of days I simply chill and take inventory and put a punch list together for St Thomas. I need lumber, plaster and food.

The bathroom window takes shape. There will be no glass.
A stout wooden or metal grill with storm shutters when necessary.

Keeping it simple and strong, same as upstairs. 2x10's cut to fit for the 8" jams and 1x4 for the trim. Everything put up with Blue Climaseal Tapcons. Counter sink, tap hole in concrete, screw them home.

 





 

 

 

For the most part the four concrete openings were pretty square and true. The one headache, always, a wall was not plumb. It was out almost a full 3/4 inch top to bottom over the ten foot height. It gave me problems hanging the trim on the door below where said wall met an interior wall. If I didn't tell you about it you wouldn't see it, especially by distracting you by waving my hands as we talk! Other than that the lumber from MSI was pretty good. As usual, I hung it wet and let it dry, bolted in place. True, I have to sand it in place rather than on some saw horses but I avoid any twisted sisters--not to mention I don't have to set aside a drying area which only gets in the way. The place is already a mess.
 



 

 

 

 

At the risk of having some of you never talking to me again here's the shack in all its glory. Every five months, or so, I get a one month reprieve back in SF. It wasn't supposed to be for this long!
I could be sitting here instead if I hadn't got this crazy idea years ago. I do scratch my head sometimes.

Then I wake up and it is back to work.

Next up the doors, 8 footers. We're living large! Three per doorway for a grand 7' 1/2" opening on two sides of the bedroom. First up, the termite damage. The picture below was pretty much the standard in a few spots. The truth is, it was a miracle that they passed them up to eat all the pallets first. Also helping, perhaps the reason, was the very stiff plastic/cellophane wrapping reflected in the picture above. It is a credit to Jeldwen that these simple fir doors withstood being encapsulated in a container sized termite nest with ungodly temps and drenching humidity. Not one door suffered any noticeable damage. There was some minor stuff, more on that later.

This is why god invented wood putty

Years ago when I had grander plans, Jim Phillips a local builder recommended that I purchase a Porter Cable Hinge Jam Template kit when he heard I had purchased "slab" doors. I took his advice---THANK GOD. $250 well spent.

Without this kit there is no way I would have been able to accurately chisel out all the jams I needed.

I had a lot of jams to cut in. With the kit, shown above, you space out your jam templates connecting them all together with the adjustable rods. After routing out each jam you simply move the setup to each door and then ultimately to the door frame itself so that every hinge is perfectly aligned. There is no way, no way, I would have been able to pull this off on a triple bi-fold setup with 8' French doors.

Below is the mock up that I had to constantly refer to. It looks simple but it does get confusing as to what side of the door you are doing.

In reality there were four hinges not the three drawn in.

Of course there had to be some drama, nothing is allowed to go smoothly without first creating a little panic. My very inexpensive router that came with a table did not have the black "sub base" shown above. In fact Ryobi doesn't even sell one. My friend Steve loaned me one off an old Porter Cable that no longer worked. I screwed it to the plastic housing on mine. Without it I could not use the jam kit. It holds the center guide such that you don't chew thru the templates with the router bit.

Hard to believe. The helicopter above, at huge taxpayer expense spends days every year flying all over the island looking for weed plants. Several law enforcement agencies get involved driving around in black SUV's. Usual haul, 2 or 3 potted plants every year. You can't make up this kind of stupidity. Meanwhile when they catch the local police dealing cocaine in quantity they basically slap them on the wrist under the pretense that they "cooperated". The guy with the potted plant gets his life ruined. The police, they get to keep their pensions. WTF!

 

 

A genuine character that I had the pleasure of talking to on several occasions. He knew he had terminal cancer which we discussed at length--the psychological changes that naturally occur so the end is not so bad if you embrace it. He did.

 

http://newsofstjohn.com/2013/08/27/a-tribute-to-pirate-bill/ 

 



 

 

The plan--a pickled white wash finish with a low lustre marine varnish. A quick sand to remove some termite problems/stains and then get them done and up. After all, it is hurricane season, that's why I am working on the doors and not finishing the walls. I now have a semi finished interior that has to be protected. The white washing goes very fast compared to painting with its drying times. It ended up taking a couple of more coats than I anticipated. The fir was tripping orange as I applied the wash, not what I had in mind. In fact, we had originally hoped to just stain them for the Tuscany look but it was not to be. These doors were meant to be painted especially after aging in the containers.

When closed, as above, the door on the right acts like a single door. I haven't put the hardware on yet. The same arrangement with the three doors on the other side, not shown. My guess is most of the times the doors will be closed but you never know. The wild goats may have something to do with it.

 

 



 Some days, actually all days I have to pull over at the over look. It never gets old. The music was playing in the truck at the time. Youtube will probably flag it.

 

Our ship has come in. The kitchen, gutters, closets, storage items and even two leather couches! Several trips to Cruz Bay/Tropical shipping to load the truck. If you think carrying down plywood or travertine has its issues you should try leather couches! Its not the weight so much, it's getting your arms around the suckers.

 

the gutters

 

Thankfully I could break it down. Same drill as before, about fifty trips down the ramp etc. I cleaned out upstairs before starting the work downstairs and now it's packed again! You think you have a small galley kitchen until you see it in parts. Good grief. It literally took me an entire day to inventory the invoices. Then when I found something missing I had to do it all over again the next day to be sure. Yup, a base cabinet assembly was missing. Ikea was good about it. However they would only mail it to SF. We'll have to transship it on our dime. We'll talk about Ikea, it's all good, at a later date.

 

 

From the "smugglers' blues" files....

 

http://virginislandsdailynews.com/news/dea-arrests-4-men-seizes-187-pounds-of-cocaine-on-st-thomas-1.1551397

 

 

 



With doors hung downstairs I jumped back upstairs and stated assembling the base cabinets in the time I had left before returning to SF. I bumped the upper cabinets off the wall so we could hide a microwave in one of them. We are not big fans of the hanging micro nor the cluttered counters look. Even if we were we really don't have the room. To keep it clean we are not even going to hang the uppers on the stove side--except above the frig.



Daddy screws up!

 





Look closely at the picture. Notice the wood inside the arch? Try to overlook that behemoth of a cabinet. The general plan/design was to frame out a refrig cabinet with a side panel separating it from the counter followed by the stove, basically the standard layout. But I f'ked up on my measurements when laying out the arch way back when. Actually the arch is exactly where it is supposed to be. The mistake was caused by the refrig dimensions I used. With the refrig deep inside a container when I built the arch I went online for its dimensions. Some how I used the width not including the door dimensions that were further down the stat sheet. Look, I never bought a refrig before. I had no clue there were two sets of dimensions. WTF.

 

I cannot convey how depressing it was, the refrig almost touched the opening of the arch. Plus if we were to have the enclosed refrig look the gi-normous cabinet above had to be bumped off the wall almost three inches. Trust me, if I had the money I would have given the refrig away and bought another "counter depth" one to replace it. That's how much I did not want to change the arch.

 

I knew everything was going too well!

 

The 2x8 boards you see above were the first leg in shrinking the opening to see how it would look. I do not want to see the refrig door when I walk through the front door. I have no idea how this is going to turn out. I'm getting on a plane. F'k it....

 

 

While they wait for the bus I'm driving to town to catch a ferry. This was a short stay, only a little over two months on island.