How is Everybody doin?
Allot of things have gotten me down over the last few years. Not to mention my Karma being so strong that it has affected corporations and communities that I have come to rely on.
When I set out from the east coast of Canada, to find my way in the world, I had one thing in the back of my mind.
Buy a house.
That was in the early 80's. While I was in Calgary moving furniture and learning to drive tractor trailer (that was self taught in a weekend by the faith of my dispatcher).
Calgary is a boom/bust economy and before long I moved to Vancouver BC (House prices were in the low to mid 6 figures and I wasn't interested in paying that much)
As I am reaching my end of life I decided I now have a new thing left to do.
I did buy a house, in 1986, for $70,000. I bought it with a girl I had recently met. Growing old with her has not been exactly what I expected
I made friends with the neighbor beside me who owned a little shack of a house with no foundation. Their lot was larger than mine and I needed a place to park a tractor trailer.
They said I could park back there but it might not be there in the morning because it will probably have sunk into the ground
I brought in a D-3 Cat and had it leveled..they treated me like a king after that and never charged me to park there. (Every few years I would surprise the two son's with beer and cash just to say thank you)
Eventually I bought that property for $200,000 and moved a house onto it and built a whole new lower floor. (Contractors did most of the work) My original reason I bought the property was to build a garage.
Life has gotten in the way, from doing that!
After my recent open heart surgery I have found new drive.
Since traveling doesn't appeal to me anymore I have decided to get on my bucket list.
I have been very busy rearranging structures in my back yard in preparations for a possible garage.
I don't know how far I am going to get but when I am feeling down I try and remember I wanted a house.
As I am working on rearranging the yard and reclaiming rocks and gravel by hand, I keep telling myself, "you got your house"
Seems to lift my spirits
and stop me for feeling sorry about things I didn't get or things that make me sad
Each was a challenge on it's own and I kept calm and focused on how I could do it. Often the answer would come after a nights sleep.
I originally thought of putting wood braces on the bottom and draging it with the Bobkitty, maybe added big swivel wheels..which I bought...
then I thought... rent a flatdeck.. screw wood to the deck, extending past the deck to lift straight up.. and tie ropes to the frame, of the structure...I used ratchet straps to pull the ropes up
Aired up the tractor suspension and the trailer tires were at a lower point so as soon as I pulled forward everything went up another 5"..
I bought a special attachment, for my Bosch jackhammer, to drive the duck bills in the ground and it destroyed the duckbills...DOH!
Picture above shows how I had to predig the holes about 20", with my bachoe attachment for the Bobkitty, so I didn't destroy the duck bill anchors..ground was super compacted by years of fully loaded tractor trailers being parked over night. (mostly full of beer...lol)
It was raining when I tried to pull the cover up..sigh
Next...
This shed has gravel floor and the uprights are sunk in concrete.
I built a floor, out of 2 x4's and 3/4" treated wood. Then I sawzeled off the uprights.
Raised it up, each corner, with the Bobkitty (barely) and got it high enough to put a car jack under it to lift it high enough for to put a single 15'ish railway tie under the middle
Added a brace in the front center because the 2x4's were sagging and now I added railway ties(3) to offset the weight on one side.
The whole structure is sitting on the one railway tie in the middle with a layer of 3/4' plywood to raise it above the railway ties on each side. The Bobkitty can move the center tie from either end and I will move the other railway ties to keep it from going off balance.
It will take up a temporary location 10' closer to house and 5' sideways. (away from the fence). This will allow a spade truck to move the 2 trees and open up the yard for a garage.
Here was the old layout of the yard. Canopy has been moved to where the tractor is and the next picture shows where the open shed was.
Just to give you an idea how big the trees are I had to top one because it got a bent top, and I had to fix it..
That tree had a grave beside it and we got to hug Chatty Cathy one more time..promised never to move her again. Her baby blanket was intact. As we dug her up I could feel her body through the blanket, after two years in the ground.
it was a, surprisingly, good experience.
We love her
post edited by SmookinJoe - 2022/09/18 10:27:30