“Did some kind of crime take place here?”
This was the question one passerby asked me this past week while I was outside painting. One would think so with all the police tape secured around my building. But if you have been following the story of my studio renovation, you’ll know all about the crazy windy day when the bricks fell from the outside wall of the ABQ Sewing Studio.
Cleanup
Clean-up started the day after the storm. A crew was quickly dispatched to clear the brick rubble and to see if they could knock down some of the bricks still hanging. Some, hanging in the corners, were perched and ready to fall anytime from the building.
The loose brick on the ground was moved with a Bobcat and then it was time to remove the bricks peeling off from the top of the building.
The plan was to then hire a Cherry Picker so that the crew could knock down the remaining rough edges of the brick wall and start re-bricking or re-siding. The Cherry Picker arrived from the rental company, the work crew arrived, and so did the folks from the local hydro utility.
Problem with power lines
Houston, we have a problem.
The problem was the main utility lines run very close to the building. The crew quit for safety reasons and the Cherry Picker disappeared along with the hydro workers. Apparently one needs 10 feet of clearance from hydro lines to safely work and there wasn’t the clearance for the crew using the Cherry Picker. The hydro workers felt the only solution would be to turn off the power for the duration of the repair. Sadly the repair would take some days and the lines involved feed power to all of downtown Strathroy. Yikes!
Now What???
The building owner’s solution
Several days later the owner returned and worked out a solution using ladders. He’ll be siding the building along with a friend. They’ve got lots of clearance using either ladders or a scaffold and since they will be doing the repair with siding it will be fairly quickly accomplished.
What’s been happening inside?
There comes a time in a renovation when things finally seem to come together. That happened this week as Ralph, Rob and I worked on the flooring. There’s over 1,100 square feet of floor in the ABQ Sewing Studio. Rob and I finished up our herculean DIY task Mother’s Day morning. It was such a relief to get that task done that it really did seem like a pretty good Mother’s Day gift. Now it’s time for me to Youtube how to do baseboard trim! I’ll be needing those kneepads again this week!
The Harry Report
Oh no! What’s happened to Harry…
We have also been nursing my poor cat mascot Harry this past week. Harry was doing very poorly, he was listless and seemed afraid to go outside. Harry lives to go outdoors so we knew he had run into some trouble out there. By Wednesday he was getting worse and his eye looked a bit swollen. Because Harry is so hairy, it’s really hard to figure out what’s wrong with him. Even the vet had to sedate him to find the trouble. It seems he had been bitten on the cheek.
To sort this all out, half of his head has had a shave. Poor fellow, he doesn’t even have a whisker left on one side of his face. The cone he has had to wear for the last few days is floppy and light but huge. All of his bowls of food have had to be placed on pedestals so he can reach them! He’s doing lots better though now that we have removed his cone, and he is back to his bouncy, happy self – ready to take on the world!
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Poor Harry!