I CAN SEE THE LIGHT!!!!
But when you gotta GO...you gotta go....
So...with the $5,000 lightbulb burning brightly behind the barn (don't tell Precious Bride!!!) and a few days left till deployment, I had time to finish a smaller project that has been nagging at me for some time now....
An outhouse....nothing fancy, just a plain, simple outhouse...
It's an easy choice for me...my regular forays into the less civilized parts of the world have made the virtues of a nice welcoming place to "set a spell and contemplate life" particularly significant, (I have to spend a layover in Charles deGaulle Airport in Paris, BOTH WAYS fercrissakes)....and with most of the big "solo" jobs nearing an end, this particular missions' priority level has been increasing steadily over the past few months...
I am just FINE with a trip out in the brush for a contemplative moment amongst the landscape, but it's long past time for a more refined system.
It's simply an idea who's time has come....
Before leaving the Ranch for home, I had loaded up the trailer with a bunch of materials from the Big Pile O'Stuff....we have been collecting barn tin, treated poles and treated dimensional lumber for a while now, and since most of it was found by Precious Bride while surfing Craigslist,the selection was excellent and it was all at "Popular Prices"...
I stopped by one of the Big Box stores on the way and picked up a few bits of hardware, tin screws, pooky and such, and backed the trailer into the yard at home were it would serve as my workbench and materials pile.
It rained off and on for a couple of days, but by Thursday afternoon, we had us one BEEEE-YOOOO-TI-FUL "Little House"...and much to the delight of the dogs, who figured I was building THEM a nice new dog house and had already taken to sleeping in it....They were not amused when I tipped it onto the trailer and drove off with it....not amused at ALL....
Precious Bride wrangled a long weekend, so we headed north with our new addition and made a nice easy trip of it....an early start was accompanied by a sack of "Yegg McNuthings" and two big cups of that liquid CRACK they call "Mocha"....JAYZUS that stuff is TOO good....
We took the back-roads as usual, and more than one vehicle passed us with with a a quizzical look as they went around what some folks apparently thought was a trailer hauling a windowless deer blind....
Truly a "BLIND BLIND" I guess...
At least they waved at us with all their fingers....mostly....I was in no rush...
We got up to the Ranch in good order, checked in at MIL and FIL's tipi, then headed up the road to the Ranch....
I got a nice snuggle of approval regarding the flower beds Precious Dafter and I had prepared outside the front gate....I can't wait till we get something growing out there...
First thing to do was prepare a foundation for this thing....we chose a spot behind the barn under a tall oak and scraped it nice and flat in one pass with the york rake...since this is a"dry" toilet, this will pretty much be its home for the foreseeable future...
Then we changed out to the carry-all, gathered up a stack of pallets and set up a compost heap in the brush area farther down the fencline ...Precious Bride had the foresight to stock up on some bags of cheap sawdust from a local cabinet shop....so we had our disposal area set up in as much time as it took to wire a bunch of pallets together and dump in some sawdust....she cut wire and I twisted...nuthin to it....
Well before dark the "Little House" was ready to go....and if you look real close at the pictures, you can see a line had already formed.....
We wound the afternoon down passing out some snickerdoodles to the Pasture Posse, who, as always, were most appreciative of the treat, and spent the evening in quiet commeraderie with MIL and FIL, drinking coffee and tell horrible stories about people who were not there to defend themselves.
Saturday morning breakfast was a nice lesurely affair but we could not linger as I had to get along and do my pre-deployment shopping and packing....so we made our goodbyes and headed south....
With the Power milestone reached and now in our wake, Precious Bride and I are more confident than ever in the Master Plan....and now we get a month to plot the next move...
Be Safe!
T
