Raph and I have had a big week!

I probably should have taken the laughter of the concreters last week when I told them that we were digging the trench by hand as an indication of just how hard this was going to be. But true to form, I was overly optimistic and with Raph needing some fresh air and exercise after a semester of computer labs at Uni, I thought it would be a good challenge.

What a challenge it was. I’d estimated a couple of day’s work, but that was before we hit nearly ten metres of rock and the sledge/crowbar symphony began.

The trench job had everything – blisters, witchetty grubs, the biggest worm I’ve ever seen, cave-ins, calluses, mud caked clothing, Triple J radio, misty rain and more.

We’ve been digging everyday since Sunday and all up I reckon we have spent eighteen hours. I’ve fallen asleep in front of the tv each night and thanks to Meg we’ve had some great meals and our share of Goon to wash it down.

I even bent the mattock into a nice curve, bashing it against the solid rock in an effort to get it to move! We’ve used nearly all of the tools in the tool wardrobe (the $1 wardrobe that I ended up with at a clearing sale has turned into a tool shed). Raph has stood for hours with the crowbar drumming out the repetitive thump… thump… thump… and everything that could have got in the way has.

We’ve cut out a heap of roots with the axe, mattock and crowbar. Chipped and smashed our way through solid rock with the sledge, crowbar and mattock and used both old and new long handle trench spades to clear it.

The odd snicker of the concreters kept Raph going as they watched on.

But all of that is over now as we finished the trench this morning.

Our new neighbour Ian arrived with the morning showers to start the wiring and the concreters arrived with worried looks, concerned about the weather and whether the cement truck would make it in.

Some discussions later, the truck made it in and I was advised that I needed downpipes to get the water out of the gutters and away from the shed. This was an abrupt about face from last week, but I got on with it and headed into Mid North Irrigation again for some more supplied.

Lucky for Raph, I remembered him and he enjoyed a pie for breakfast when I returned!

We dodged up some temporary downpipes, wedged with wood and the bench and at enough angle that the guys could work underneath.

The truck made it out without drama but added another set of ruts to the rapidly deteriorating driveway as Raph and I laid the cable and conduit to the power box.

It seemed like it was all happening at once when the glaziers arrived to replace the broken window in the shed. Well, they nearly arrived as their van only made it 20 metres into the drive before getting bogged!

Raph and I took a break for lunch with a nice steak on the barbie and plenty of spuds. We needed to take stock of what was going on and relaxed as the sun came out from the clouds.

With the trench over, we were almost at a loose end, until I spied the woodshed and suggested some cladding. Maybe it was me, but Raph seemed to hit the nails especially hard as the tin was added to the framework.

The last on our list for the day was a trip to Des’ place to pick up the toilet. Luckily we’d met Des a few weeks ago and chatted about sustainable building and living and he’d mentioned that he’d upgraded his composting toilet and had a spare.

Raph and I loaded it up and had a quick chat to Des about a few things before heading home.

It has been a huge week of development, but I feel that we are well on our way now.

Meg and I had driven to Adelaide on Friday night to get an early start on what we expected to be a busy Saturday. This plan was negated somewhat by catching up with Dave and Cindy for drinks on Friday night but it was great to catch up with them and chat at the British in North Adelaide.

Despite slightly sore heads, we had picked up Raph and checked out the salvage yard before a lunch catch up with Tracy and Christian.

I’d left Meg with them and returned to the salvage yard to cut the deal on the timber with Raph.

The negotiations were a bit dodgy, but with the incentive of cash and a bit of “I’ll just check with the boss” we managed to get about 200 linear metres of permapine of various dimensions in 3 metre lengths, enough to make the floor of the toilet and a solid wood door at a very reasonable price.

Raph and I picked up the sink and carpet from their Dad’s place (thanks Peter!) and added them to the already heavy trailer before picking up Meg and heading to the hardware to spend one of the gift vouchers on assorted bits and pieces. With the shopping done, we eventually hit the road for home with a full car and trailer after 5pm.

After a slow Sunday start at the folks place (at which we were house sitting), Meg, Raph and I headed out to The Journey and started work.

The concrete floor of the shed was finished and looked pretty good. I’m glad that we decided to get it done professionally as Raph and I would still be working out the cement/gravel/sand mix and how to put in the reo, let alone the hours of mixing and laying while learning how to smooth it out to get a good finish!

We had a great barbie lunch, even though it was freezing cold with a strong, biting wind.

Meg worked on the pond and her rock wall while Raph and I started to dig… and dig… and dig. The trench for the power to the shed had to be 30 metres long and 600mm deep and we had until Thursday to finish it.

Meg set up the second pond and after a little coaxing, we finally got the solar pump working in the overcast conditions, pumping up into the higher pond to make it overflow into the lower pond again. Hopefully this will clean the water and help us work out if we still have fish – I’m sure they’re in there somewhere.

Meg was disappointed that the concreters had just dumped the excess mix on the ground and also on some of her rocks that she wanted to use for the rock wall near the tank, so Raph and I did our best “strongman” impersonations with the sledgehammer and broke it up. I think that we’d better get used to tradesmen dumping excess, offcuts etc as it seems to be the way they work.

Meg placed it in the drain at the bottom of the drive as more fill for the coming wet conditions while Raph and I got back to the trench.

With the promise of Goon and chilli, we redoubled our efforts and dug until sunset.

After a morning’s work on some web projects, I met Meg for lunch in Clare and we walked along her usual path to the cemetery and back.

So much is happening lately that all we could talk about was electricians, the cement work, digging trenches and how all of this was going to fit into the next week or two. As well as that, we are heading to Adelaide on the weekend and picking up a sink and some old used carpet as well as buying some timber to make the building for the new (second hand) composting toilet. It should be a big weekend!
While talking about the timeline, Ian our electrician and neighbour rang and we confirmed some issues relating to the job. This also meant that we needed to do some work to get the wiring under the concrete and nicely out of the way.

Meg and I headed to Mid North Irrigation and James helped us out with everything we needed – conduit, 90mm PVC, a drain, fitments as well as some glue to hold everything together.

I got out to the Journey in time to catch Adrian and discuss the requirements. He’d already laid the plastic and reo in place and was packing up, but helped nail down the location of the trench and drain.

With everyone gone, there was only the trench to dig down to 600mm, a task that I was not looking forward to. Adrain and his lad had laughed when I said that Raph and I would dig the 30m trench to the power box!

More than two hours later, I had pretty much finished digging the 1.5m trench out from the shed! Next week is going to be hard work.

It was good to swing the mattock in fury (as it turned out to be) and forget all of the dramas of the shed delivery and build.

The conduit slid nicely into place and then the drain for the shower was a breeze – at least the digging was over for today and I could relax and take a few pics of the shed and the sunset.

It was time to head to the folks place for a nice warm shower and maybe a cider or two.

This hasn’t been the best of weeks.

After the awesome, hassle free job that Trevor did on the earthworks, the shed has been one disaster after another.

Last Tuesday (the delayed delivery date) I rang to find out what time the shed would be delivered as I still hadn’t heard back from them. After getting the run around, I finally got onto one of the sales staff and told them that they needed to work it out.

This happened and I was told that the shed would be there Wednesday. I tracked down the freight company in the afternoon and checked that all was in order.

Wednesday I headed to Adelaide to drop the folks off at the airport and received a phone message from the sales guys that went something like:

“Hi Rob! How are you? Hope your doing well! By the way, you might have noticed that we haven’t delivered your roller door… Could you give me a call back? Thanks.”

As I was in Adelaide, I did one better and went and saw them.

It seems that they failed to mention that I would have to arrange a freight company to deliver my shed, even though I’d specifically asked to be quoted on freight to Clare. Next, they had “forgotten” to order our roller door and that would be a four week delay.

I mentioned that the builder would be there in the morning and after some phone calls, was told that the brackets for the roller door had to be there for the build, but obviously weren’t.

An hour later, I left to pick up the roller door brackets from their supplier but with the agreement that I would pay no extra freight to get the shed to Clare and that I wouldn’t be paying anything additional in four week’s time for the roller door installation or freight and the Store Manager would call me to discuss “compensation”.

Mark the builder shook his head when I met him the next morning at the Journey. It seems that he had seen it all before…

Half an hour later, while checking the stock, he asked me how big the shed was. It seemed that another order had been partially delivered instead of ours!

Luckily, a few phone calls later our posts and supports were on a ute out of Adelaide for delivery. If they had have been delivered to the other job, Mark would have packed up and come back in a week of more.

The final setback for the job was Friday morning with the shed nearly up. Mark opened the packaging for the windows and one of them was broken. I couldn’t believe how much was going wrong with a seemingly simple job of ordering from a quote, delivery and building. Imagine if we had decided to build it ourselves, second guessing the parts and then probably being told that we broke the window ourselves.

It was a hell of a week, but it seems that they are going to send us out some gift vouchers to make it up to us. We’ll see.

If we are going to occasionally stay in the shed (not live in the shed because we don’t have permission, but maybe the odd night here and there) then we will need to have some form of heating.

I’d done some checking around and the cost of combustion heaters is much more than I’d thought – starting from the $2000 mark. Then I’d checked Ebay and saw some more reasonable prices but nothing local.

After getting home last week, Meg went online and saw a combustion heater in “as new” condition that had just been listed at Semaphore – where we had just been yesterday!

It had a starting bid of $350 or a “Buy it now” option for $400. Given the prices and availability that we’d seen we didn’t hesitate and got it.

Today we had traveled to Adelaide and picked it up. The listing had said that there was some firewood with it and we thought that maybe we could share with Caro and Rod as they just lived down the road. Then we saw the two sheds worth and soon after Bec was around with the ute as well!

Thanks to the guys that we bought it from, we had the fire out in less than half an hour. Raph and I manhandled it onto the trailer while Meg and then Rod and Bec loaded wood into the trailer and two utes.

After helping to unload one load at Caro and Rod’s we left them to it and headed home to unpack. Now we need a woodshed!