By request, building Bard, a build thread - Page 4

**bradthebard** · 11-01-2009, 01:50 AM

Another update.

Quote:

Late spring found the roof on and the dormer framed up. A dormer on a roof that has a sloping ridge is a really odd thing. Had I known that the slope of the ridge would screw with that many of the angles of the frame of the house I would have punched myself in the nose and told me to just make a normal roof. As is happens I did not punch myself in the nose and the roof came into being as it now sits. Adding to the mayhem was the constant use of salvage material. All told, the wooden components of the house are about 80% recycled/salvage or harvested off the land itself. Soon the gable ends were enclosed and the preparation for the construction of the strawbale walls on the main floor was well under way. The walls sit on a rubble...

Trees and Voices

spife7980 · 11-01-2009, 01:25 AM

great entry, and i will repeat what others have said "write a book"

youre like a modern day Thoreau in more ways than one.

Tarukai · 11-01-2009, 11:52 AM

That update is great. Very nice and awesome to read.

**bradthebard** · 11-01-2009, 03:18 PM

On a related note, I drove out to the cabin today to find that someone broke in and stole the wood stove.

I dislike people today.

**bman9089** · 11-01-2009, 03:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bradthebard

On a related note, I drove out to the cabin today to find that someone broke in and stole the wood stove.

I dislike people today.

That blows. I can think of stronger words than dislike for theives, so you're a better man than I.

BTW - where's the bunker?

**bradthebard** · 11-01-2009, 03:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bman9089

That blows. I can think of stronger words than dislike for theives, so you're a better man than I.

BTW - where's the bunker?

Well, what I was thinking at the time was how I'd love to have been in the bushes with a shotgun at the time.

Bunker was to doube as a root cellar but has not yet been built.

**Timothy_90** · 11-01-2009, 04:06 PM

Awesome entry. Not only is it a great and admirable story, your retelling of the events that shaped your very existence is done in a fashion reminiscent of some of the greatest writers in history. If you wrote a book, I'd buy it. I'm sorry to hear about the stove, thieves are worthless parasites on society.

Comanche_ · 11-01-2009, 06:56 PM

That sucks. But i wonder, off all things, why would someone go to the effort to break into the cabin, and then steal a woodstove. Odd thing to steal.

speepdaedeesi · 11-01-2009, 07:01 PM

awesome writing. i will be following the blog.

sucks to hear someone stole the stove, but karma will kick in.....

**bradthebard** · 11-01-2009, 07:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Comanche

That sucks. But i wonder, off all things, why would someone go to the effort to break into the cabin, and then steal a woodstove. Odd thing to steal.

It was likely a close neighbor. Someone who had a shop or cabin or something that needed a stove and they knew where one was at that wasn't closely watched. Passed up the chainsaw, the nice shop vac and a few other things. It wasn't a random event, somebody planned it. The least the bastards could have done would be to not have dumped ashes all over the damn floor. No vandalism either.

**bradthebard** · 11-01-2009, 11:55 PM

straw

Quote:

An eighteen foot equipment trailer will hold 350 strawbales quite well, provided you drive carefully and stack them in a manner that is worthy of an engineering degree from MIT. I had neither degree nor inclination to calculate the proper stacking method, but driving slow enough to make the farm tractors flash their lights and wish their horns still worked sufficed

straw

**Divinitous** · 11-02-2009, 10:13 PM

Great stuff man. You're an inspiration to us all.

-Shoey- · 11-03-2009, 12:38 AM

I second Divinitous.

rickm8 · 11-03-2009, 01:22 AM

My question is, where did the beer come from!? Not to be harsh, I greatly respect, admire, and love the what you did, but I don't get how that adds up...

**bradthebard** · 11-03-2009, 08:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rickm8

My question is, where did the beer come from!? Not to be harsh, I greatly respect, admire, and love the what you did, but I don't get how that adds up...

Are you talking about the bud and miller light? It came from the grocery store I would imagine, though I don't recall exactly.

By not meaning to sound harsh I would assume the unwritted part of that is "what are you doing buying beer if you are homeless and destitute and stuff?". The majority of people hear and read my story and decide that it is the acts of a desperate man at the end of his rope and with no alternative. I was incredibly broke and laid off at the beginning of the project, but I did find a steady job and made a paycheck. I could have dropped the whole thing and returned to a "normal" lifestyle at that point but I wanted to see it out. The reasons were somewhat ideological and in some ways naive. I did it because I wanted to do it. I am a better man for it, but it wasn't my only option.

I say all that to say, at the end of a long day of hammerin and stackin and plasterin I am not opposed to sitting down and turning a bottle of beer upside down. If the kids were hungry and I was boozing that's different. They weren't.