Busy little ants

I have alluded to several projects that I have been working on over the past few weeks. Well here are a few pics. The big one was fixing, or rather building a roof at our Ohio Ren Fair booth. When we got the place, we knew its was little better than a tar paper shack. There's no polite way to say it. It was not built well. This was made worse by adding an extension off one side. At some point the previous owner must have planned to build a roof over the back quarter of the building but this project never happened. There were only a few bare rafters which we have thrown tarps over to keep the worst of the leaking at bay. Our booth is so ghetto that no rennie will work on it. That says something. So I made a call to someone who knows no fear. His name is Cowboy and with his abundant help we managed to build two complete roofs in two days. I wish I had more pics but we were pretty damn busy.


Here's what we had to work with. Three rafters, uneven floor, useless rolled roofing material. The one good thing is that the booth is made from rough sawn Red Oak.


Action shot. The extra fun part was that the stairs leading up to this roof are completely rotted and totally unsafe. But there was no time to work on them. We just kept praying we wouldn't drop straight through and break a leg.



By midnight Friday we had gotten this far. You can't see it here, but we built another complete roof near the front of the booth. A week later I finished the flashing, used a crapload of silicone, closing off the open area and finally put something on the back wall which was exposed studs. I'm pretty confident that this will stop the leaking.

The other project has been helping my friend Grimm fix up his house so that he can sell it. His wife is already in North Carolina at her new job. So he's basically on his own for most of this HUGE project. I am amazed at how much he's gotten done but it's the last 10% that can just drag on. I'm proud to say that I helped rebuild a deck, install a drywall ceiling & texture it as well as move a lot of heavy materials. Oh yeah, and I helped burn a lot of things that made me feel fairly guilty. I mean my hippie gene was just disgusted with myself. At some point a whole lawnmower was consigned to the flames.

It's close to completion now. Some painting, trimwork and a lot of yard work. I'm glad to lend a hand but it's a bittersweet project. Once it's done the house goes on the market and Grimm will be free to join his sweetie permanently. I'll miss him and his wife. They're a great couple. I've learned a LOT from Grimm on all manner of subjects and his IS my closest neighbor.

So, anyone looking for a place in the country? It's got land, a pond, a barn and has had a LOT of high quality renovation done on it. I'm talking an amazing marble tile bathroom, radiant floor heating, new carpet, kitchen, the works. Sure it's in Amish country, but you can shoot off guns out there and no one will mind. Interested? Drop me a line.