Saturday, we had thunderstorms most of the day.
Sunday we demolished our old deck and put up the stairs. Here’s a progress shot when we first took a break:
We knew, when we first bought this house 15 years ago, that the deck was not very well constructed. But we didn’t realize just how bad it was until we had to tear it down. I am not a carpenter, architect or this kind of engineer but I know wrong when I see it.
- We knew that more than one joist was rotten. What we didn’t know is there was exactly one that wasn’t rotten. It seemed to be newer wood, horizontally nailed to an older one that was pretty far gone.
- In the middle of the photo you can see the only support post — and I use “support” in the loosest possible sense — where a joist or beam was sitting atop it, rather than horizontally nailed to the side. There were no joist hangers or brackets, and no big bolts — just nails. A few of those nails had sheared off, and about half had simply worked loose over time.
- None of the posts were anchored in the ground at all, just sitting atop the concrete pad. One of the posts was nailed to a fencepost that is embedded in a blob of concrete — but you can see that fencepost itself at the left side of the photo, it’s not in great condition itself. At least most of the posts were still solid and not rotten.
- There were attempts at diagonal bracing… just nailed onto the side of joists and posts.
- The “beams” weren’t what I would call beams, more just… edge pieces.
- There was nothing at all resembling a moisture barrier.
- The ledger — the board that is attached to the house — is supposed to be protected by flashing which redirects water from getting behind it, and is supposed to be attached to the house with carriage bolts every few inches. It had no flashing and was nailed in place maybe every 3 feet. One of those nails was sticking out a good three inches, bent and rusted.
Here’s the “finished” state for now. We’re leaving that railing and lattice in place until we get a proper fence and a new gate put in — since the post up against the house isn’t anchored to the ground, the only thing keeping it upright is a remaining bit of decking attached to the ledger. Probably what we’ll do when the fence is removed is paint the ledger white and leave it on.
There’s still most of the opposite side that we left in one awkward piece, leaning out of the way, and a lot of mostly-rotten scrap wood with nails in it that we will have to dispose of. The entire set of steps on its stringers came out in one piece, and we may be able to use that to replace the rotting railroad ties that lead up from the patio to the back yard level. But we accomplished the main goal: making it safe to step outside the back door. It was a lot of work, which we had been perfectly willing to pay someone else to do if they had showed up, but we exchanged being very sore (my spouse had a bad RA flareup and my back has lodged a long list of complaints) for saving a chunk of money.
We have much more confidence in these steps — rated for 1000 pounds, OSHA certified, not built by amateurs, and rock-steady as you walk on it. The dogs however, are not thrilled. Lady was seriously reluctant to go up at first, but is getting better. Yankee is a bundle of neuroses covered in scraggly fur, and is often weird about stairs and hallways; right now he will run down the steps if you place him on the landing, but won’t come up without being carried — and he will often not want to be picked up, instead barking at the door and then running away when you try to assist him. (And sometimes he asks for an escort just to go to the kitchen and drink some water.) Crazy little weirdo.
We still have a lot of home stuff left to take care of. Some of it is cosmetic, some more functional but not quite as high priority. But the big expensive issues, and the ones involving personal safety and keeping our house from collapsing are taken care of.
Update on Rico: as of yesterday afternoon the visiting doctor who did his ultrasound Thursday still hadn’t sent the full report to our vet’s office. There were apparently some communication problems because the x-ray, blood pressure readings etc. they sent her had to be re-sent too. But what we do know is… the ultrasound didn’t show anything.
With nothing else to go on, they speculated based on his age that he might have cancer that might show up in an abdominal ultrasound (Thursday was just his heart/chest)
His heart rate was in the 160-170 range despite being sedated (he was very anxious, as many cats are at the vet) and they were expecting 140. (Looking around online I see wide ranges of “normal” values for cats from different vets, so I would not worry about this too much if it weren’t for the bloodwork results.) They asked me to check on his heart rate at home when he’s relaxed, over the next couple of days. This is a bit tricky, because there are only 3 places where you can normally feel a cat’s heartbeat, they might not want to be touched there for very long unless they’re really relaxed and content… and then they’re purring hard. But I think I measured around 130-140 last night.
He hasn’t made his startling painful yowling noise for the past few days, and the probiotics I’m giving him (Pet Honesty bites, which he absolutely adores) seem to be working too. So maybe this was a passing thing. I don’t want to subject him to more medical procedures that will make him uncomfortable if they can’t solve anything and he’s not in distress. On the other hand… if he does have cancer it’s better to catch it earlier rather than later. Hmmm.
I’ve got about 21 minutes of music recorded, and a Bitwig project with the foundation for the next track. This has been more “assembled” than most, with individual drones and sequenced loops being made in separate sessions and then glued together, with or without additional parts. I’m leaning toward this being similar to Parallax or Luminous Phenomena, with two or three roughly 20-minute tracks consisting of stitched-together sections that flow together.
So far, there’s a been less live playing — even what I played on the bass guitar got turned into a captured drone. But it works overall, and that’s what’s important. Maybe for contrast, I will have a section where there’s a lot more live improv, if I can make it coherent with the rest.
My latest read was Sir Callie and the Champions of Helston. Written by a local, it’s a middle-grade — but not childish — novel about a non-binary kid confronting conservative, patriarchal, transphobia, gender essentialism, and misogyny (these are all pretty much the same thing) as well as complex feelings about family, a friend with depression, etc. Despite sounding super heavy, it’s charming and infectiously fun and I want to read the rest of the series.
The author was a former HP fan who felt betrayed by JKR’s swing from “beloved children’s author” to “billionaire TERF troll.” Callie was originally going to be a trans boy, but that just didn’t feel quite right — “definitely not a girl, but also not a boy” did. In figuring out why, the author’s own nonbinary egg was cracked.
