Today is......

Today is a big push day. When I get done here I need to get brave and go out and climb down into a hole and dig out the mud. The mud is so slimy with having gotten rained on so much that it is impossible to use shovels, post hole diggers.. anything! Once it gets attached to whatever tool you are using, it just sticks! It is much faster to just pull on a pair of mud gloves and dig it out by hand. Although it feels like some sort of torture or punishment, it is faster and I REALLY want to get done with this.

Once this last footing trench is dug out, I'll be filling it with gravel that has a lot of fines in it. Then it will be left over winter to settle down hard. Next spring it will be ready for building the hobbit house...FINALLY!! There have been ample opportunities to give up on this project. I don't know why I haven't.

I have to gear up mentally to get down there. I'm a little bit claustrophobic and you get in the trench and you just have straight walls of dirt around you. It's cold and damp and just plain depressing. The footing trenches caved in on the garage footings and the house footings as well. I dug both out by hand a second time. The house caved in again. Next time I had some help, supplied by my kids, to get it dug out. Again it had to be done by hand. When we got those footings poured for the house the heavens opened and the angels sang. The next day it rained.

With Mac's leukemia recurring last year, I was just never able to stay ahead of keeping the garage footings open. I had to give up on them. A neighbor came over with his tractor and pushed the dirt back in. It was the end of a long , hard fought battle.... that I lost. I don't want to lose the hobbit house too.

It has been dry a week and who knows when that will happen again. It might be my last chance to have this come out in my favor. So I will gather together my sick sense of humor and my warrior woman nerve and I will climb down into a footing trench one more time. It's always easier if you have someone with you. Even if they aren't working. Someone to just be around. But I don't have that so I'd better just get over it and get this done! I'll take pictures!

My last big push..... we're almost there.

louie

Another PS. today GOOD MORNING, BRAZIL!! GOOD MORNING, INDIA!! GOOD MORNING, IRAQ!! I'm assuming the last one is a person in the armed services. Hope the adventures of a crazy lady in Iowa gives you a taste of home.... not that I think your family is crazy... or that you live in Iowa.... Well, anyway, HI!!