Glenn's Underground Cabin Update

[glenn kangiser]

A few more underground building tips....

In this pix, I failed to explain a few tips my buddy, J had on lining up notching on the logs.



He peeled them and cleaned them up with the draw knife, then to get consistent cuts on the notches he snapped three lines with the chalk line.  He still used the chainsaw but his stepped cuts and depths were all consistent getting even depth and step on all cuts.  He is using the EPDM liner for best waterproofing and he is also putting the French drains in to allow any water to drain downhill to daylight - free flow without pumping.

Note the raised concrete pads with moisture barriers under them - put in slightly wet under the posts and they conform to the post end for good bearing.

He did use the  to do the precision cuts.  Nice job, J.

[Sassy]

Since Glenn has been gone so much lately, I've been having frequent visitors...  this morning I walked into the master bathroom & a foot long lizard was waiting for me to turn the water on in the bathtub.

Tonight I was sitting in my recliner looking at stuff on the net & a bat decided to catch some bugs above my head...  don't know how it got in 

The other morning I woke up & felt something crawling on my leg, it felt like a huge bug when I tried to push it off - there was no lingering in bed for me - I jumped out & there was a bumblebee walking on the sheets 

There's been 2 huge spiders in the bathtub & a scorpion in the bed - at least I saw the scorpion  before I crawled in.

Oh, we've had 2 pet frogs in the shower...  I took one out because our visitors from Africa (Ethiopia & Botswana) were afraid it would jump on them - they must have thought we were pretty primitive...     I put the other one in one of the plants in the uphill patio.

Guess they don't want me to be lonely 

[glenn kangiser]

Friendly critters I guess.   

Sassy likes open doors and windows also, so most of the visitors we get are also available in the above ground versions of houses around here. 

Funny that when I think of our visitors from Africa and other countries I think of people who are used to roughing it and being around animals, bugs and snakes, etc.  Not so though.  They are nearly all from big cities and not used to being out in the country, so when they get to the Underground Complex, they are really roughing it..... life in the Wild Wild West, eh? 

[glenn kangiser]

BTW,

Happy 14th anniversary, Sassy.  Dinner is on me when I return to the Underground Complex.

Well..... not literally on me...... that would be gross...... [ouch]

I mean ... I will pay for it....  

[Sassy]

Happy 14th anniversary to you, too   

We could cover you with whipped cream   

I miss you...

[ben2go]

LOL @ Gleen and Sassy,you should hide with a whip cream pie and get him good.  Darn it! I should have PM'ed that to you.  Happy 14th to the both of you.

[glenn kangiser]

Now, don't go givin' her ideas, Ben..... [ouch]

Thanks for the good wishes though. 

It's like I'm stuck in a bad dream and can't get back home..... 

[glenn kangiser]

Not even sure if I can make it home this week.  A giant load of steel coming Monday but I understand 5 loads of stuff from other companies will be there also.  I may try to get it Sunday.  If I go home I have 8 hours of driving for the parts of two nights and one day home..... [ouch]

I guess I will see what happens today.   

So much for getting anything done at the Underground Command Center.......

[glenn kangiser]

It's o-fish-all.  hmm

I decided to try to get the load of steel Sunday and the company said the extra $300 to do that would be less than the stand by time because we had to wait for 5 trucks to unload - that would be all day as there is only room for about one forklift carrying things at a time and there are people running around like ants all over doing things in the same place at the same time.  

The underground guy tossed me the keys to his backhoe on his way out of the yard today, so I could clean out a place to put the steel (he helps me - I weld things up for him...a win...win)

GC management balked a bit but I told them I would unload the truck on Sunday even if I got sent to jail.  I came there to straighten the steel out for my client and that is what I'm doing.  The erecting crew would be standing around likely for two days if I don't have that steel sitting on the ground Monday morning, so the truck will be here at 8AM.... YEA...  [ouch]

I guess I looked crazy enough that that was the end of the discussion.  Safety director called me tonight.  I suspect he will drop in tomorrow.... so I will be sure he does not catch me with my pants down.... you know.... not get caught unawares.   Speaking of which... I've been here so long I'm running out of them......

[Sassy]

Are you going to wear your bikini?   

All your clothes are washed, ready for you to pickup    Guess you'll have to go to the laundromat or Walmart for new ones. 

I planted a few more veggie plants (peppers & squash) & weed eated around the rest of the house (this is the 4th time this year!)  Watered everything, weeded a bit, trimmed roses, put up some bamboo blinds to block the sun a bit from coming into the house & heating it up too much, emptied my car after going shopping at Costco yest & taking some stuff from my parents home.

My brothers & sister & I are going to have an estate sale this next Sat - guess it's about time, my dad has been gone for over 2yrs now.  If it wasn't for my sisters-in-law starting on it, we'd still not have anything done...  Spent several hours over there yesterday w/my brothers & SILs.

The weather has been great around here - in the low 80's & cooling off at night.  Usually it is in the 100's - we did have a few days of 90's. 

I finally put the rug low enough in the bathtub that the big lizard could climb out - now I don't know where it is    Then there was a little lizard in the sink - they really like that room - hopefully they eat all the scorpions...  just as long as they don't crawl into my bed    Haven't seen the bat tonight - it flew around a couple nights in a row. 

Oh oh, the dogs are all barking & running after something - hopefully it isn't the cows - I haven't seen them since Glenn left.  Guess I'll have to drive the Bushhog around tomorrow to get them to come back up so I can feed them some hay - they must be getting plenty of food to eat... 

[glenn kangiser]

I'm working alone today so no need for safety gear, eh? 

I need to mention that if the underground house is sealed as well as a regular house the critter visits will be about the same.  I just haven't done that.  [ouch]

All houses in our area get the occasional lizard and scorpion and Sassy likes to have the doors open often during the day.  Ants get into every house around here and ant control in the U-house is the same as others.  Put the sweets where they won't get to them and fill them with Terro until they stop.  

The scorpions around here are just the little wood scorpions and they dine on other insects, as well as the occasional nibble on Sassy's leg.  Their sting is quit a bit less than that of a bee.

At least we are not infested with cockroaches like they are here in the big city.  

Seems I heard one of the workers mention one crawled out of his burrito one time.....

I saw a raccoon in the water runoff about a block from my motel room a couple days ago.  Amazing they could be here in Metropolis.

[ben2go]

Sassy,good luck.I know it's hard to go through loosing a parent and then having to sort their personals.

Gleen,good luck with the safety grunt and be safe.Wouldn't want the safety grunt to get a load of steel dropped on his head.

I know about them critters and bugs.We used to not have any issues with them.Everyone that owned a farm,wood land,or other larger undeveloped spot of land,sold out to developers.Everything living in there went straight into the older developed properties.I regularly catch racoons,oposums,feral cats,fox,field rats,the list goes on.I went from living in a small rural community to living in a urban community.City sprawl at it's worst.We have more unzoned business here than any where else in the US,I believe.

[Sassy]

Yep, their everywhere...  I just like funnin w/you guys.  We have all the comforts of home here, very cozy - there are some places that need to be closed in better which would resolve some of the problems.

I like the air flow & do often open the doors - we have a pond on our roof that the bats like to dip into so they probably think there might be some good eats in the house.

For all the years we've lived here there probably haven't been more than 6-7 little scorpions that I've found or been stung by in the house.  Our previous neighbor who had a custom built house had more problems w/scorpions than we have. 

I used to keep pet lizards in my house in town - they'd live on the window sills & eat any bugs that got there.  At our place in the country down in the valley I've also purposely put lizards in the bay windows on my plants.  The little tree frogs are good, too - I kinda miss the little guy in the shower    In the valley we have coyotes, field mice/rats, owls, possums, skunks, lots of ground & tree squirrels, feral cats...  there's probably other wild animals around there that I haven't seen.

As long a the bears & mountain lions don't try to come into the house up here & the raccoons can stay away, too - they are a big nuisance.

[glenn kangiser]

Yup.. gotta love our critters, and the frog pond on the roof helps keep the garden a bit more bug free.  Can't blame the little froggies for wanting to come into the cooler house in the summer, eh?

Got my load of steel delivered at 8 AM today and had it unloaded in about an hour and a half without even one other truck, person or machine in my way.

I felt like a real genius when I saw all of my steel laying there in that nice big pile that all the other trades and 5 trucks will have to work around tomorrow.... Yay for me, eh...

I guess I only need to be safe on Saturday.... The safety guy didn't show up or call today and he knew I was doing the same thing 30 feet up in the air that I did the day before..... oh well ... at least he played his part.  I was only swapping out 300 lb beams on a manlift by hand... [ouch]

I of course wore my safety gear... not the pink one, but the fall protection device and I attached it to the basket too.... most of the time.  On a good note, I only tripped on the lanyard once while bending over to work.  They get tangled around your boots and are generally more of a hazard themselves that they are protection, if you aren't drunk or on dope.  

[PEG688]

You prolly got more done today alone than you'll get done in the next two days with "help"! 

[glenn kangiser]

I have to agree with you there, PEG.  

Tomorrow it will be everybody over everybody and everyone in everyone else's way.

They never do a logical progression on jobs anymore.  It's just everyone get your part of the job done as fast as you can even if someone else should have done something first.  Example.  A brick wall is over the area where the window canopy was supposed to mount.  Back to the engineer for a tube hanging down from the tube steel above then to the detailer to make the changes then to the shop to make the piece then the revised size shade to be made and get it done by the first.  I ordered the tube ahead of time to weld on so we don't have as much chance of spattering the glass that is being installed this week on B building.  [ouch]

Besides... I was able to use everyone else's equipment today too.  We seem to be trading use of equipment on this job more than many of the other jobs.  Most of the trades are pretty good about it and it is a problem job for everyone... but it is work when work is scarce.

[pmichelsen]

I saw a raccoon in the water runoff about a block from my motel room a couple days ago.  Amazing they could be here in Metropolis.

There used to be a lot of raccoons near my place now, I remember coming out to my truck one morning to go to work (around 4:00am) and they were all over my truck at least five or six. I banged my boots together yelling at them to get lost and they all slowly walked off of my truck and then lined up and stood on their hind legs and gave me a look like "what are you gonna do". Fortunately they took off because quite frankly I don't know what I would have done.

[Sassy]

   They are arrogant little creatures, aren't they? 

[glenn kangiser]

I can tell you they can bite a hole through a rubber boot and kill a cat, pull a chickens head off through chicken wire... maybe even kill a dog under the right circumstances.  Not Spike though.  He nailed one in the garage along with the help of the neighbor dog.

GC called a meeting with my client today.  Mentioned that they were still waiting for that truckload of steel promised for this morning.  They said, "Oh, you mean the one Glenn unloaded yesterday?"   Glad I unloaded it yesterday. It was pure chaos in there today. 

We were off the hook on that one.  

In general things went good at the meeting and I understand the GC even gave me a great big compliment.  He said things have really improved since I got there.  The guy I first had the go around with now realizes that I am here to make it all better for them, so even though it is the job from hell, he is giving us full credit for doing our best to help get it under control.  Her said he can't ask for more than that.  

We of course will continue to do our best and salvage all that we can of what is going to be a hard fight all of the way.  I know of more problems yet to try to beat.  [ouch]

[glenn kangiser]

Rained out today in the afternoon..... so took a bit of that time to do a thing I have been wondering about since shortly after I got here....

You know PEZ... those little plastic candy dispensers that puke out a little piece of candy when you break their neck back?

Well, they have a whole museum for them with everyone that has ever been made here in Burlingame.  Certainly couldn't miss that.... [ouch]



http://www.burlingamepezmuseum.com/

There I learned that:

Austrian candy executive Eduard Haas invented Pez candy in 1927. The original little candy bricks were peppermint. In fact, the word Pez is an abbreviation of the German word for peppermint.(PfeffErminZ) Pez candy was originally sold in small tins. The first Pez dispenser appeared around 1950.

Pez was originally marketed as an adult mint for people trying to quit smoking. The first Pez dispensers, known to collectors as "regulars", did not have character heads. Around 1952, cartoon heads and fruity flavored candy were introduced. Since then, over 500 different heads have been made.

Pez dispensers have appeared in such movies as "The Client", "Stand By Me", and "E.T. The Extraterrestrial". A Tweety-Bird Pez had a recent guest appearence on "Seinfeld." Besides popular T.V. and movie characters, Pez has created many characters of their own, the latest being the Pez-A-SAURS. Other Pez character series include "Pez 'N Pets", "Mr. Ugly and Friends", "Pez Pals", and "Pez Circus Characters."

Pez Candy, INC. is located in Orange, Connecticut, 06477

Check out their site for more.....

Now .. my most interesting part of the museum was the failed toys display.  My favorite one.  The children's home nuclear experimenter kit
-The Atomic Lab -  with real  radioactive material...... Yea... look at me glowing in the dark.... [ouch]



We don't have any cool stuff like that in the Underground Command Center.....

[Texas Tornado]

Happy Birthday Glenn 

[glenn kangiser]

Thank you, TT. 

I am trying to ration them so I don't run out.  I am limiting my usage to one a year. 

I hope that is a wise choice.

[mtman]

Happy Birthday Glenn 

[ben2go]

I can't believe that they produced a nuke lab toy.Awesome!

Happy birthday again,just in case you didn't get the other one.

[Ernest T. Bass]

Whoa--I'm an hour from missing it! Happy b-day Glenn!