Things rush on. It's already mid-July and it's 34 degrees in Montreal and I'm glad we're not there. Besides you can't make fires in Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue.
When you get a 'burn permit' here it lasts two weeks so you burn every superfluous wooden scrap for two weeks solid. Last night (Wednesday, that is, to show you that I don't lose track of time completely) we had a huge burn in front of the garage. Lots of roots because the Master Builder had showed up after lunch on Monday, pulling me out of a rather pleasant nap, to dig up the driveway and re-direct our main drains by pipe away from the garden and the septic tanks. Two hours later the 40 feet of pipe is buried and of course now there are new roots and scraps of wood to burn...
And, by the way, when the MB rolls into town on his backhoe, everything stops and we work on his project. He's very busy this year getting his Lake plane back up in the air so his time is very precious. We're on his list but not very high: the plane's the thing. So when he's ready to do something we down tools elsewhere and get it done.
In the meantime I have been working (fiddling about really) at finishing around a couple of windows and then getting the garage walls ready for siding which the MB has already cut with his sawmill -- we only have to take off a slice of each board to allow us to lay them one on another. I'll be learning how to apply boards horizontally.
And of course I have to build our daily bonfire...
So yesterday, after the passage of the MB and his backhoe, and under Deborah's supervision, I dug out another 30 feet to extend the underground drain pipe beyond the back of the garage (which is 30 feet square) so that she'll be able to grow asparagus and rhubarb in the soil in front of the garage.
I'm coming to today, Thursday, because that's my story. Now the biggest problem here is getting stuff to us: there have been some miraculous deliveries (the bed with the fridge and washer and dryer -- Home Depot take the prize) but mostly it's a matter of going to Sydney or Port Hawkesbury or Halifax and ferrying stuff back in our trailer. So today, Thursday, we go to Sydney to get our screen windows from NorthAir, the Cape Breton company which also made most of our windows and doors.
I think it will be a half day, but I always get it wrong. We leave at 9.30, get back at 6pm, a whole day of it. 225 kms.
The day starts well: I fix the electrical wiring for our trailer. It's lightly raining and we make good time to Sydney, stopping in East Bay for coffee and a muffin. I love the baking around here: very high standards.
The windows are ready and magnificent, but they don't take cards. We leave the trailer full of windows and head into town to find money. First a call at the farmer's coop to buy some plants and a branch cutter. Then to the bank downtown, a magnificent building from 1901 with neo-classical ambitions. Then on to a rather uninspiring lunch at Allegro on Charlotte Street and a quick walk around the craft and art centre. On to a Home Hardware in search of spare filters for our water system and then to Home Depot to pick up various bits and pieces... Then back to Super Store to food shop for the week and finally make it back to the window factory at 4 pm, It looks like it's closed. Only one car in the parking lot... She's there...
An hour and a half later we pull into Cape George and slowly get ourselves up the hill. Unload all this stuff while Deborah works at a wonderful meal.
Which goes to show that an 8-hour day of in and out of shops and factories can be exhausting, but luckily we now have a nice bath to fall into and Netflix to turn on to watch the last two episodes of The Hour, a wonderful British thriller set in 1956 in and around the BBC...
And tomorrow I am scheduled to work with the MB on his sawmill producing siding.
Geddit? Another day of small triumphs. It's a great way to keep moving, working through a lot of jobs. Great training camp.
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