a peek of the pour

Here's a quick photo diary of the foundation pour.  There's not enough time at this moment to devote to telling you about the up and down event that was the foundation pour.  Let's just say a brush worth of glue and not paying attention to the weather forcast can really make a foundation pour go south very quick and turn an already stressful day into complete chaos..............more later

 

 

when it pours it rains

Tomorrow we are scheduled for the big pouring of the slab.  It was originally scheduled for today, which was a beautiful perfect concrete pouring day, but it was pushed until tomorrow for some reason.  As luck would have it, or not have it depending on the level of sarcasm, there is a 40% chance of rain tomorrow followed by a day of 60% and right into a day of 100%.  Everyone seems a bit less concerned with this than we are but I suppose that's how it goes when it's your ink on the check.  It seems like this stage has taken much longer than anyone anticipated and I know everyone is anxious to pour, myself included.  Let's hope they don't screw it up for the sake of convenience.  El, our architect, is planning on shooting a timelapse video of the whole thing which should be pretty awesome.  I'll keep you posted.

Other happenings include having to deal with the electric company which I would put in the top three most frustrating experiences of the process so far.  I'm convinced that there are only about 3 people that work in the entire utility company and the rest of it is just answering services and push button menus.  After about two and a half weeks of trying to get somebody out to the property I finally made it happen after several calls to a supervisor.  I was afraid the guy might be angry at my persistance and that he might make things more difficult for me.  My fears only deepened when he showed up onsite and proceeded to vape as we made introductions.  Luckily, the guy turned out to be alright and what I had in mind as far as where to run power turned out to be fine.  The temporary meter is already set up I just have to clear a few branches so there is a clear line of sight to the pole.

Here's a few pics below of recent work.  We'll let you know how the pour goes...............cheers

shinging in the rain

As luck would have it, weather conditions seem to be mirroring those of the great flood of 1998 here in San Antonio. Something about converging fronts and extreme humidity creating "the perfect storm."  Except in this version it's not George Clooney taking his fishing boat head first into a rogue wave it's our half completed foundation taking on a three day vertical wave from the sky.  The foundation guys were at least aware of this and prepped the work they've done up to this point with large sheets of plastic. This is what it looks like. 

The rain started about 6pm and it was both heavy and continuous. So about 11pm my curiosity got the better of me and I just had to see for myself. I had always wanted to stand on the property just to see exactly how the water naturally drained. Plus, I wanted to make sure everything was properly covered and/or that the wind hadn't blown off any of the plastic coverings.   So off I went. 

Before I left I did properly prepare myself. Well, sort of. I had a decent raincoat and rubber boots. What I didn't have were rain pants so I improvised. Snowboard pants!  Snow is made of water and rain is really just warm snow without the distinct patterns, right?  Maybe not, but close enough.  So after grabbing my ultra powerful flashlight and navigating around the flash flood induced low water crossings I made it to the property. I parked the car so I could utilize the headlights. It was really a lot of what I expected. Some of the plastic had been blown over so I moved it back into place and readjusted the 2x4s on top. The guys had done a pretty good job covering things. As far as drainage, there is definitely no standing water anywhere. I think there will likely have to be some work done to redirect some of the water after the foundation is poured.  It was actually pretty cool being out there in those conditions. It was like a scene out Jurassic Park. It was a very exotic, tropical kind of atmosphere, a combination of the rain and darkness I suppose. Although there were no signs of the T rex I'm certain that if had chosen to hide in the portapotty that he would have shown up and devoured me in dramatic and disgusting fashion.  So after I slipped out of my rain boots back into my Birkenstocks I made the drive back home quite satisfied with myself. Maybe I helped keep portions of the foundation dry or maybe I was just playing in the rain.  Either way, it was worth it. 

all about that base

I was talking to the foundation guy today and apparently the slab is taking more effort than anticipated. It seems they underestimated the amount of base that would be needed. They had 25 truckloads of base ordered and had to bump it up to 28. He told me there were something like 20 yards per truckload which translates to 560 yards of base!  Crazy I know.  I once ordered 2 yards of base for some landscaping. It took me about 3 years to distribute it. Most of that was due to procrastination but you get my point. These guys are working crazy hard. In fact, we stopped by on Saturday and we unexpectedly found these guys working. I figured the least I could do was buy the guys a 12 pack so that's what I did. 

They are just about done with the bagging and should be putting in the steel rebar next. I'm not sure it will be happening in the next couple of days since the forecast says there will be some serious rain. Not a problem, like I said before we wanted to delay the pour until next week anyway so we would be in town.  How could we miss it?  At this point the pouring of the slab is the first real physical step, the first actual symbolic gesture, the first, dare I say, "concrete" transition from concept to reality........