LB and I were out the door by 6:30 for walkies and a nice Jeep ride to Landlady’s where I fed the chickens and then loaded up concrete and what little rebar I had.
Boy, I should have bought lots more rebar. I scrounged some old iron conduit just because it’s better than nothing, and then got lucky: A desperation visit to the Pile of Old Parts scored me four lengths of absurdly thick rebar from Ian’s foundation project.
Don’t even remember how they got there. But between those and a little conduit here and there, I’d have enough vertical. Trouble is I didn’t have anything that would cut them…except it turned out I did. My friend T, dead and in the ground nine years…
…had a tool he’d bought but didn’t know how to use. He bought it for cutting rebar, too. I used to be a wrench, and went to tech school when you still used things like cutting torches. So I did know how to use it. But I couldn’t believe this one still had gas in it after all these years. Apparently Landlady got the tanks filled at some point.
So that simplified things.
Then when I finally got the verticals in place, it was a simple but hard matter of schlepping concrete till we were done.
Not forgetting the pagan foundation sacrifice, of course…
As Conan said, I don’t fear the gods, but I wouldn’t step on their shadow. I’m not really a pagan, but living in a place like this can, from time to time, make you at least consider the wisdom of looking into it.
Now all the pier footings are in. It’s only 9:30 and there are still plenty of other things I could be doing, but I’m already very sore. I’m going to make a cup of coffee, take my leg off and have a bit of a sit-down.
Thanks for the good wishes. Things are going slowly but well.
Your sawzall would have done that job, assuming the correct blade. You only need to cut about 1/3 way through, and then bend.
Do you or Landlady or Ian have the hood and the rest of the gear that go with those tanks? Being able to run a bead could come in real handy every once in a while.
The project is coming right along enjoy your cuppa.
I have metal cutting blades for the sawzall and it was fine, if slow, for the smaller diameter bars. But trying to cut the big ones got ridiculous.
Your friend was born a month and a half before I was. That’s depressing.
Good idea to placate the Gods. Crom will be pleased ! I helped a guy tear down an old house once up here, dating from the 1840’s. The wood foundation rested on a stacked field stone foundation. When we took out the corner posts, he found an old coin from the 1830’s under one of them.
Your offering, it is good. 7.62?
Sort of. According to the ancient edicts of the Holy Church of the Immaculate M1A, which I just now made up, the offering should be ammunition of your primary long gun at the corner foundations of the structure. So the Lair proper is warded by 7.62 Nato, but the bedroom – since I’m a lapsed M1A owner and thus deserving of lesser protection – has mere 7.62X39.
I then am a mere acolyte as my reliquary (wrong term) contains mere unworthy 5.56.
Every pour I tired to put a new penny under the concrete.
And sometimes a pop top from a beverage.