Friday

 6:47 am - Friday- March 27th - Yuma, AZ - 53° F, 15% humidity,  1% cloud cover,  wind 3 mph out of the northeast. 

We will be leaving for our dental appointments in a few minutes so I will not be posting today's missive until this evening. 

Thanks fur stopping by!

Back to the barn roof.....

 7:33 am - Thursday - March 26th - TWW - 50° F, humidity 16%, cloud cover 5%, wind 4 mph out of the southeast.....mostly clear blue skies today with a forecast high of 81° F.  On this date in 2013 TLE and I were at Augusta National Golf Course....

....in Augusta, GA, the site of the annual Masters Golf Tournament.  We were there about 3 weeks before the annual event.  The view this morning....

We had two goals for Wednesday....try to raise he roof in the barn enough stop the rainwater from pooling, and then leaking through the roof, and then tighten down all of the sheet metal screws affixing the metal roof panels to the rafters.  We spent the better part of 3 hours raising different sections of the roof, then spraying water on the roof to see if it still pooled, or ran off the roof as it should, and finally decided to raise the main load bearing beam at the mid point (two 2 x 10's bolted together) an inch, then place a 4 x 6 beam under it....

There is a large steel plate under the base of the post 

which will prevent it from sinking into the dirt

....that seemed to provide the best results.....water still pools a little bit, but mostly runs off the end of the roof now.  It doesn't pool enough to leak much.  Then Charles and I spent another hour tightening ALL of the sheet metal screws on the roof of which there must have been several hundred.  Next week when Charles and Phyllis return we'll reseal all of the seams, and all of screws with clear silicone  (GE).  We may still have a few small leaks here and there, but nothing like we've been dealing with the last two winters.

It was around 1 pm when we finished giving us a good four hour work day in which we got a lot done.  Now that we've eliminated the preponderance of the leaks, we can begin to store stuff inside the barn.

We convened for our usual communal dinner around 4 pm.  Phyllis prepared wonderful hot pastrami sandwiches which were enjoyed by all.  Around 6:30 pm (sun sets at 6:50 pm now) on the 'sunset fire deck' (no fire this night....too warm still)....

.....there were a lot of contrails.  We will be leaving shortly (Thursday) for Yuma, AZ, and our semi annual dental checkups, so I'll end this missive now wishing ya'll a great day, thanking you once again for stopping by!

Insulation board installation.....

 7:43 am - Wednesday - March 25th - TWW - 50° F, humidity 17%, cloud cover ZERO %, wind 5 mph out of the southeast.....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 82° F.  On this date in 2012 TLE and I were overnighting at the Walmart in Daphne, AL.....

.....we got out our bicycles and took a ride along the seashore, then stopped at East Shore Cafe for a late lunch.  The view this morning....

....time to wash that window....lol.

After checking on the greenhouse first thing Tuesday morning TLE and I got to work installing the insulation board I bought a couple of months ago....talk about procrastination....lol.  We worked about 3 hours, cutting and installing the hardest pieces.  By the time we stopped it was after 1 pm, and we had both had enough of working in direct sunlight....

....I had to reposition the Bluetti battery bank to make room for the insulation board.  We cut and installed three pieces along the back wall.  Then the ceiling, which was the most difficult piece, then the right wall.  All that remains is the piece for the left wall, a small piece in the left corner, then the door pieces and we're done.  I bought six 4' x 8' insulation boards, and I believe we will use them all.  There is a lot of waste as we cut the individual pieces to fit the space, and we've used 3 of the 6 so far.  This is a much tidier insulation installation than the fiberglass one we did last winter.  The remaining pieces will be the easiest cuts of all, and shouldn't take more than an hour.....famous last words?

Charles and Phyllis arrived around 1 pm for another two day stay.  Once they were unpacked they hooked up the water trailer and headed over to the water station with TLE.  I had had too much sun at that point, and decided to remain behind while they fetched another 1,870 gallons of water.  Upon their return around 3:20 pm I headed over to the water tower to help Charles pump the water into the top, then the bottom tanks.  We, apparently, were within 50 gallons of filling filing the top tank when we ran out of water last Sunday, so we were able to put around 1,800 gallons in the bottom tank, leaving just 700 gallons to fill it.  We'll do that when Charles and Phyllis return again next Tuesday.

By the time we finished pumping the water, putting away the suction hoses, and the Predator water pump it was a little past dinner time, so I washed up and joined everyone in the house for our communal meal.  Since we got the water haul done on Tuesday we can spend the bulk of Wednesday working on leveling the barn roof, then sealing it so it won't leak anymore.  That will be another major milestone here at TWW.

Thanks for stopping by!

Stumped.....

 7:38 am - Tuesday - March 24th - TWW - 48° F, humidity 18%, cloud cover 6%, wind 4 mph out of the east by southeast.....a few clouds, but very sunny today with a forecast high of 83° F.  On this date in 2012 TLE and I were in Baton Rouge, LA.....

....having Beignets and coffee at Rue Beignet.  My first time eating Beignets (pronounced binyay).  The view this morning....

We've been in this mild heat spell for what seems about a week now with temps running from the low 80's to the high 80's (seems like two weeks).  We've both been wearing shorts and t-shirts all day long every day now.  The gas furnaces run maybe 20 minutes first thing in the morning, and then all the windows, and I mean all the windows, are opened for the rest of the day, and well into the evening (I just opened my salon window at 7:56 am....that was unheard of 10 days ago!).  We've been deploying our doorway screen door for at least a week beginning early afternoon.  All that being said, relief is on the way!  By Saturday we'll be back into the 70's, then 60's through the first week in April.

We began our work day as we usually do by visiting the greenhouse to see how our growing produce is faring.  The two potato beds have exploded with greenery, we now have cauliflower developing at a rapid pace, and the broccoli is well into producing its second crop....

.....I've said this before, but it really kind of cool to plant stuff and see it grow....especially stuff you can eventually eat!

Next up I poured some more diesel on the tree stump we've been trying to burn out of the ground, then added firewood on top of that....

....we kept adding fuel to the fire all day long, and by the end of the day we had a pile of ashes, but they were still hot.  In fact, this morning (Tuesday) they were still hot, so we added some more firewood to see how hot it was, and it caught on fire again....

....so, obviously, that means the stump is still smoldering deep down inside.  We'll keep added more fuel throughout the day, and see where that gets us, but for now we are 'stumped'....lol.

After fiddling with the burning stump for a while we decided to completely remove the old fiberglass insulation from the shed so we can install the new insulation board Tuesday.....

....it took longer to remove the staples which we used to fasten the old insulation in place than it took to remove the insulation, but the shed is now ready for the installation of the new insulation board, which we moved over from the garage.

After all that was done TLE headed indoors to the cool confines of the Newell, while I headed over to the CONEX/barn complex to cut up numerous cardboard boxes which we had pulled out of the barn when Charles and Phyllis were here over the weekend, then, with TLE's help moved that to our future burn pile.  Then  I moved a bunch of stuff we had leaning against the barn to the rear of the barn to clean up the clutter.....

Looks much better now

The damaged solar panel and other stuff I moved

The cardboard ready to be burned...

....in the recently created burn pile (in the background)

....and with that I finished my workday.  About the time I returned to the Newell TLE was heading over to the house to do another load of wash.

We are slowly becoming acclimated to warmer weather, and now we are heading back into a cooling period.  Of course, when we arrive at Likely later in April it will still feel like winter there....lol.

Thanks for stopping by!

Twenty-nine days.....

 7:32 am - Monday - March 23rd - TWW - 49° F, humidity 16%, cloud cover 26%, wind 3 mph out of the east by southeast.....mostly sunny today with a forecast high of 81° F.  On this date in 2017 TLE and I were on a hike with my son Chris, and his wife Rochelle.....

....to the top of Mt. Rubidoux in Riverside, CA.....has it really been 9 years?  The view this morning....

....yeah, we finally deployed the window awning for the salon....the sun is that high in the sky now!

We were up early Sunday, and by early I mean 6:30 am, which is early for us in the winter.  We usually avoid being out of bed before 7 am, but we wanted to get an early start on getting another load of water for TWW.  We thought we needed just one more 1,870 gallon load of water to mostly fill the two 2,500 gallon tanks in the water tower.  We believed there were at least 1800 gallons in there, since we had added 330 gallons Saturday to what we thought was at least 1,500 gallons.  At any rate we were on the road to the water station around 8 am.  We arrived around 8:30 am, just before a long line developed.  By the time we finished filling our tanks the lineup was 7 vehicles deep.  Had we been just 10 minutes later we would have been behind a 5,000 gallon water truck, which takes about an hour to fill....we know, we've been behind him before....lol.

We were home before 9:30 am, and began to fill the upper 2,500 gallon tank.  We figured it would take around 7-800 gallons to top off the top tank, then  the rest of the water would go into the bottom tank, but we were way, way WRONG!  The top tank took all 1,870 gallons, and was still not full....doh!  Were we ever off in our guestimation!  It till take another full load to finish the top tank, and partially fill the bottom tank, which means we were down to about 3-400 gallons of water....plenty of water to be sure, but way less than we thought we had.

After finishing the water project we took a break at the glass picnic table in the middle of the circular driveway, then went over to Phyllis' Newell to deploy the patio awning for the first time since she bought it in November of 2024.  As you will recall, I cut back a few branches from the tree which borders the RV site to be sure the awning could be deployed, but still wasn't sure there was enough room, so this was the proof of concept moment....

Just barely enough room....lol!

TLE and Phyllis enjoying the glider

....there was just barely enough room to deploy it, but it was perfect!  By early afternoon Charles and Phyllis were making the drive back south to Phoenix.  They'll be back again Tuesday.

After their departure I poured more diesel into the tree stump to burn it down some more, then headed inside to watch a few more March Madness games.  The biggest news of the day basketball wise was #9 seed Iowa defeating #1 seed Florida (Gators) for the first really big upset of the tournament.  The other games went as expected, with several being one sided blowouts.  My UCLA Bruins went down in flames to UCONN, losing in the end by 16 points.  The game was actually pretty close until the last 8 minutes....UCLA was down by just 4 points at the time.

Our time is short here at TWW with just 29 days remaining in our sojourn.  So much to do, and so little time remaining.  We're beginning to get that 'hitch itch' again, and soon it will be time to begin putting away our stuff, and preparing the trailer for VW insertion.  For the third day in a row I'm wearing a t-shirt and shorts first thing in the morning, and the heaters have been off for at least 30 minutes.  Usually they run until after 9 am, or later, but now they're off by 8 am, or earlier.

Thanks for stopping by!

Hauling water.....

 7:13 am - Sunday - March 22nd - TWW - 48° F, humidity 15%, cloud cover 65%, wind 3 mph out of the east by southeast....cloudy skies today with a forecast high of 80° F.  On this date in 2025 Charles and I had finished applying the first coat of pain in the greenhouse, which use to be green....

.....a second coat was applied at a later date using an airless paint gun....much, much faster!

We haven't been to the water station in at least 6 weeks, and with the bottom tank at the water tower now empty, and just a thousand gallons remaining in the upper, as well as just a 1,000 gallons left in the 2,500 gallon tank we use to irrigate the orchard it was time to make a water run.  All four of us were in Charles and Phyllis' Ford truck hauling the water trailer 8 miles to the water station around 9 am.  As you know we can haul 1,870 gallons at a time in 6 IBC water totes affixed to the trailer, so this would be the first of two trips to the water station this week.

We were back at TWW around 10:20 am, and began refilling the 2,500 gallon tank out by the orchard.  It took 5 of the 6 IBC totes to top it off, and then we moved over to the water tower to pump the remaining 330 gallons into the top tank.  We'll return on Sunday to the water station to secure another 1,870 gallons of water which should come within a few hundred gallons of refilling those two tanks.

By the time we had discharged the final 330 gallons into the top tank it was noon time, and time for our midday break, so we all convened at the glass picnic table in the middle of the circular driveway.  Where we have the picnic table is perfect, because it is shaded by the surrounding juniper trees 90% of the day.  

We spent part of the afternoon unloading plywood, 2 x 6's, 4 x 4's, and 2 x 4's to be used in future projects, then analyzing the reason the barn roof is leaking, and how to fix the problem.  We had basically determined previously that there was a low spot in the roof about half way between the CONEX and the north end of the barn.  That is where the metal roof panels overlap.  Using a level we determined the water was pooling right at the seam which runs from east to west on the barn top roof.  Normally, if the roof were sloped properly for its entire length, the water would just run off the north end of the barn roof, and there were be little, if any leaking, but with the low spot right were the load bearing beam is situated allows the pooled water to seep through the seam.  The solution is to jack up that load bearing beam, and install a couple of 4 x 4's, cut to the appropriate length eliminate the low spot, and allow the roof to drain properly.

By the time we finished it was after 1:30 pm (we had worked 4.5 hours) and time to escape the 85° F high of the day.  I spent the rest of the afternoon watching March Madness, while TLE read.  Texas (#11) managed to upset Gonzaga (#3) to advance to the Sweet Sixteen 74-68 in a very exciting game.  Most of the other games saw the favored teams winning handily.  UCLA plays their round of 32 game Sunday evening, so we'll see if they are up to advancing to the Sweet Sixteen.

We convened at the house for dinner around 4 pm, and were treated to scrambled eggs and hashbrowns by Phyllis and Charles.  Who doesn't like breakfast for dinner?!

Thanks for stopping by!

The hot one!

 7:39 am - Saturday - March 21st - TWW - 52° F, humidity 13%, cloud cover 19%, wind 4 mph out of the southeast.....mostly sunny, blue skies today with a forecast high of 85° F.  On this date in 2015 TLE and I were enjoying a sunset fire.....

....at Lone Rock, UT (just north of the Arizona border on the shores of Lake Powell).  The view this morning....

We enjoyed a somewhat relaxing day Friday.  Our main goal was to finish draining the water from the bottom tank before Charles and Phyllis arrived late afternoon.  We were sure it was almost empty....maybe 100-150 gallons remaining, so we refilled the IBC water tote on the southeast corner of the greenhouse, which we had used to water the potatoes Thursday.  When we turned off the pump there was still water in the bottom tank, so we began filling 5-10 gallon water containers TLE uses inside the greenhouse to water the plants (cabbage, cauliflower, onions, broccoli, etc.), and just we finished the final container water stopped coming out of the water pump, but we weren't done.  There just wasn't enough natural water pressure left in the bottom tank to push water uphill to the greenhouse.  We decided to just water the juniper trees across from the water tower, and within 20 minutes the flow stopped completely....finally it was empty.

It was still pretty early in the morning, maybe around 9:30 am, so I decided to bore those holes I mentioned yesterday into the stump from which I cut the 5' tree trunk on Thursday.  Once that was done I filled all five holes with diesel, then lit it.....

.....it burned just like I thought it would, and continued to do so all day, and into the early evening.  It's not done yet, so I'll add some more diesel on Saturday, and light it again.

Friday was another hot day (our hottest since we arrived back in late October) with the high temp getting to 90° F.   The interior of the Newell remained pretty comfortable until around 1:30 pm when it began to get very warm.  We had all the windows open, something we haven't done for months, and the roof top vent fan running to vent hot air out the roof.  Running our A/C off our Bluetti battery bank is not an option as it would deplete it too quickly.  Those AC's are 44 years old, and draw lot of amps.

Charles and Phyllis arrived around 4:45 pm.....we had already eaten at 4 pm knowing they would be arriving near 5 pm, so we spent an hour, or two inside the house, where it was quite comfortable (that house is very well insulated) until almost 7 pm talking about life, and what they wanted to get done this weekend.

By the time we returned to the Newell the UCLA March Madness game had just 5 minutes remaining with UCLA up 9 points over UCF.  They hung on to win by 4 points, so they will play in the 2nd round of 32 on Sunday afternoon.  I don't have high hopes for them, but they are playing their best basketball of the season right now, so who knows, right?  That's the whole point of March Madness....anything is possible.

Thanks for stopping by!