There's Snow Business

Ed has been working on the plumbing for the last two weeks. I've decided that being a plumber is an underappreciated job, and for several reasons.

1. We all need it, but nobody wants to admit it.

2. It's really boring work.

3. It doesn't photograph well.

Ed was getting pretty frustrated because the waste lines had to go into the ceiling of the garage area (or under the floor of the apartment, depending on perspective). Cue in Paul Simon's "One Man's Ceiling Is Another Man's Floor". Well it's not like the garage is empty. There are piles of lumber, tools, tool buckets, firewood, loose coils of extension cords, not to mention a freezer and a 71 Boss 302 Mustang silently waiting to be restored. Try setting a ladder over that! A stack of can lights, the bedroom ceiling fan, a wall heater..on and on. Now drop the temperature to about 30 F just to add icing (sorry couldn't stop myself) to the irritation cake. Finally, he had to stop. We cleared out some stuff, and things went much more smoothly.

Finally he was to the point that he had to know where the drain line for the bathtub was going to go, so off to town for a tub. We were pretty sure we wanted a porcelain over cast iron tub, but we thought we'd look at all of them. The fiberglass is much less expensive. The deciding factor was weight. Can Big Ed haul a six gazillion pound cast iron tub up 15' in the air and through a window by himself using only a rope? The answer? Well of course he can! I'm a believer. But why should he? We got the fiberglass tub.

He finished up the rough plumbing for the kitchen and bath sinks, bath/shower, toilet and washing machine. It's all hooked up to the septic lines, and that's a very good thing.

This last weekend, we had snow. Don't you roll your eyes at me in that tone of voice! It's as much snow as two people raised in the desert ever need to see. It was darned cold..(stop that!) and we found out that the plastic water supply pipe doesn't flex well when cold, so we brought it into the house to warm up. Not exactly a decorator item for the living room, but whatever..Did I mention the door to the pumphouse blew open and we had forgotten to turn the heater on for the winter? We caught the pipes just in time.

Tuesday morning we got up and it was 16 F. That's about as cold as it ever needs to get. We were expecting more snow during the week, so Ed finished up the door, and installed it. He also put a sheet of plywood over the front window opening to keep most of the snow out. Once we get the plumbing and wiring done and inspected, we can get sheetrock delivered and put that window in.

We've had about 7" of snow in two days, which for us is a lot. 7" of rain here is no big deal, but snow...well that's another ball game ..a snowball game.

I've taken this same shot off the balcony during the summer, fall, and early winter. So I took one of the snow in the pasture. In the spring, I'll take the last of the series and call it art!

OK..ok, just two more cause I'm goofy about the snow..

That's it. Thanks for not laughing out loud.