Beginning to Look Like Something

Now, the various piles of metal that I've been collecting are beginning to look like I might be making something. It's a shade house for Dianna, so she can have a comfortable veggie garden to putter around in.

The photo below shows the start of the project. Placing flanges to ensure proper spacing. Of course, this entails drilling into the concrete and placing plastic anchors for the screws to hold the flanges securely in place.  Although, to be honest, they don't have to hold all that much. There's very little weight that each flange will have to deal with.

Placing the First Bits

About the same time as the flanges being placed, I wanted to find someone to curve some fence tubing so I could have a roof structure for the shade house. Lo and behold, I found a place, Vasco Doors and Windows. It turns out they actually have a manual tubing bender. You have to adjust it for the proper length and curve and all that math sort of stuff. But, they were able to give me the absolutely perfect formed tubing. Each piece is fourteen feet long and has a two-foot rise for the curve, making each piece twelve-foot six-inches long when finished. and They did a great job.

Curved Roof Sections Keep Appearing

The next part that I worked on was placing the vertical posts in place. These were cut from the length of tube that eventually formed the curved roof bit - before it was bent, of course. They're about four-foot six-inches long, to match the far side fence height.

Vertical Pieces Going Into Place

After that, I had to get some bar stock steel cut into six-inch lengths (I did that myself with my hacksaw) and then also find someone to bend them to as a loop covering the horizontal tubing piece over each vertical tube.

Horizontal Tubing Going Into Place

It turns out that Vasco, again, was the ideal choice to accomplish this mission. I gave them a drawing of the task and within a couple of hours had accomplished it. I had pre-drilled each piece in order that they could be bolted to the top of each vertical piece of tubing, four in all. I had to drill each vertical pipe piece to accept the bolt. It actually took a bit of grinding to get each piece to fit properly so that the horizontal tubing could pass through. If I'd been able to find proper sized top cap with loops, I wouldn't have had to do anything like that

 Now, I had to find some Gate Tees. In order to have something to helop describe what I needed, I dismantled one set of tees from my lumber rack that is on the back breezeway. I took that one with me to show (a picure's worth a thousand words, right?) as I was trying to find fourteen more just like it. The Tees on the left below, are the shapes that I really wanted, and that was my reference set. The ones to the right are what I finally found after three different stores.

Gate Tees, Left Correct, Right They'll Work

To be fair, Lano's Hardware did have the correct shaped tees, just the wrong size. I finally found these at National Hardware and bought fourteen of them.They'll work fine.

I had to come up with a way to incorporate the antenna pole into the framework since there was no way to avoid not doing so. I decided to just have the horizontal pieces meet at the vertical pole and bind them together with some of the same metal I used to hold the horizontal pieces. It'll work fine

Strapping Around Antenna Pole

I was now ready to put in the curved pieces. Up to this point, even though everything was bolted together, it still fit loose enough that there was a lot of wiggle room. As soon as we started putting in the curved pieces and tightened the bolts up on either side, you could just tell that rigidity was coming to the project - finally.

How The Curved Pieces Fit In

Dianna helped me insert and stabilize the first curved piece. She had to support it by standing on a ladder at the middle of the arch while I tightened up the bolts holding the tees at either end of the curved piece. The rigidity really comes from it being anchored to the fence on the left side. This is really a two-person job too. The curved piece is just too unstable until you can get it secured in the tees and get the bolts tightened up.

First Curved Piece Is In Place

Once we got a curved piece installed at both ends, the whole thing seemed to tighten up and it was clear just how much room there was going to be inside the shade house. It'll have about 8-foot of headroom at the center and about 5-foot at the sides. Should be adequate for just about everything Dianna will want to grow.

Curved Bit At Either End

Before we knocked off for the day I positioned the rest of the tees. We'll have seven curved pieces spanning the 25-foot length of the shade house. That should really stiffen things up.

All The Tees Are Ready

We had to quit for the day. It was just getting too hot and we were too sweaty to do much more. Besides, you just don't want to rush these things, do you? Besides, we needed something to do tomorrow.

The Next, Next Step

Well, I finally got one fourteen-foot length of tubing over to Vasco for them to attempt the bend. Their 'maestro' did a very creditable job. I was impressed. I took two more lengths over to them yesterday, intending to pick them up yesterday, but as things do, plans changed. I picked them up today. Yesterday, we headed off to Orange Walk as Dianna had another appointment with the dermatologist, Dr. Peter Craig, which went well. Goes without saying that we did lunch at Nahil Mayab.

The tubing, once bent, actually seems longer than when I took it in. Must be one a them 'optacular collusion' kinda things (Many thanks to comedian Norm Crosby, the 'Master of Malaprop' for helping me understand that English is a language made for playing with). I used to enjoy seeing him on the tube when I was a young kid.

Bent Poles Arrive On-Scene

Back to the topic at hand here. Well, sort of. At least another digression. Yesterday, I took a pair of Keen sandals over to the shoe repairing shop in Ranchito, to have the rear strap re-sewn. It was about one thread away from breaking. I picked them up on our way to Orange Walk. I have a new pair of Keens. I don't like them near as much as my old ones. They don't seem to stretch correctly. I think the fabric they edged the elastic with doesn't stretch near enough. Anyway, I only made it for a short walk this morning wearing the new ones. The dang things wore a hole in my left middle (bird?) toe. Went right to the hole stage, bypassing the blister altogether. That's what they make bandages (or sticking plasters, as the Brits say), right?

Speaking of Brits... I watched the Queen give her address to both houses of parliament to officially open the celebration of her diamond jubilee. Very nice speech for an 85-year old broad. Both houses also got her a nice present to celebrate the event - a very large stained and leaded glass window of her coat of arms installed in Westminster Hall. The Duke was looking quite good too, considering he's 91-years old and just recently underwent heart surgery. I'd like to see her make it to her platinum jubilee. No British monarch's ever done that before.

As long as I'm going all over the place... How about those Cubs, huh? This could be the year, folks.  Course, it might be a long stretch with the way they're playing in Spring Training. But, "Hope springs eternal" somebody famous once said. Go Cubs!

Here's an interesting item. Doug and Twyla, neighbors of ours just up the street, sent this picture to me the other day. They have a new arrival.

Doug and Twyla's New Pineapple

Yes, that's right. They've grown a pineapple. It looks pretty cool. Hopefully it will be able to reach maturity and they'll get to enjoy the 'fruits' of their labors.

Last and hopefully not least, this was my 800th post to the blog. I think I'm supposed to say say something like "I can't believe I've done 800 posts!" But that wouldn't be true. I do know I've done 800 posts, but not in a tired or burnt-out way. Just an acknowledgement that blogging has become something I do, like getting dressed in the morning, or better yet, that first cup of coffee in the morning. That gives me a jolt and usually, I get a jolt from writing the blog.

Oh sure, if I was really with it, five years of doing the blog has the potential for over 1,800 posts. Obviously, I've fallen asleep at the wheel a time or two (by the way, that's the name of a great West Texas Swing Band. If you ever get the chance to see them, don't pass it up). Anyway, I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I do writing it.

All for now.

Cheers

The Next Step

The next step in the shade house project actually is the first step. I had to go to Lano's Hardware to get the flanges, nipples, and screws to mount the flanges on the low wall.

Installing the Flanges

That part is done. I did that yesterday. This morning, Denis rode with me while we went into town to see if the muffler shop was open. They were. You're probably asking what that has to do with making a shade house. It's fairly important in a way, as they're my best hope at getting some 1 3/8" fence tubing bent in a gentle curve to cover the twelve-foot span from the existing fence to where the flanges are.

From the muffler shop we went to Lano's again to buy one length of tubing, getting it cut to fourteen-feet, with the extra six-feet becoming an upright and fitted into a flange. Denis and I took the long piece back to the muffler shop, where we met with the first disappointment of the project.

The owner told me his bending machines were 'angle-benders' and couldn't make a gentle curve like I wanted. Bummer. His assistant had thought the other day that they could do that. Shows why he's the assistant. Anyway, the owner did say that a couple of the shops making burglar bars may be able to jury-rig something and accomplish what I wanted. He suggested we start with Botes' Metal Fabrication, or Vasco Doors and Windows.

After wandering around a bit, we finally located Botes', but they were closed. So, it was off to Vasco. We're in luck - maybe. They think they can do what I want. Anyway, the fabrication 'Maestro' was pretty sure he could. They said to come back around 4:00 PM today to pick it up. I probably won't make that time as I'll be thick into things as the Men's Group meeting. So, I'll probably check on it Monday morning.

See, that's why things never get done on time here. One party or the other always gets waylaid and delayed for some reason or the other and no one worries about it. No one calls to say I can't make at the specified time, they just show up whenever. I've slipped into the same mode. Ain't it grand?

That's the end of the project work for today. More updates to come, I'm sure.

Just Another Manic Monday

Today, Dianna, Elsie, and I started off with a yummie corn flakes breakfast. Then it was off to town for shopping.

The first place we stopped at was a furniture factory Bob had turned me on to. Located near Menzies VIP Services, this place purports to be able to build just about anything you can provide a picture of or describe. They said they make all the couches, etc., for Courts - the big furniture chain here in Belize (who seem to specialize in setting up time payments more than anything).

Dianna Talking to One of the Carpenters at the Factory

We'll come up with some ideas and take them to the factory (Comfort Rest Products, here in Corozal). Dianna may be able to reproduce her favorite sectional.

After looking at lots of options for fabrics and talking about possibilities, we left there and went to see if we could find another furniture factory I had noticed months ago behind Caribbean Chicken. We found it (Manny's Furniture, also in Corozal). They only make over-stuffed couches and chairs as it turned out. No fabrics, etc., to look at there.

So, after Manny's, we went to the Corozal T-Shirt Shop, to see if we could find some string-shoulder tee's for Dianna. No luck there.

After that, we went to Scotia Bank so Elsie could get some cash, then we went next door to B's Store to look at some books and "knicky-knackys" as Bob calls them.

And from there we went to Dee's Store to look at their tee's with no luck.

Then, we strolled up the street to another shop that was rumored to have a good selection of tee's. Same story.

From there, we went to Frank's Meats so Elsie could reserve some salmon to pick up after we had lunch.

On the way to lunch at Miss June's, we decided to get mundane grocery shopping out of the way at Dee's Supermarket on College Street, including refilling two 10-gallon water bottles.

Lunch was at Miss June's Kitchen back down at the bottom of the hill on College Street. We all had roast pork with rice and beans. Superb as always. Leaving Miss June's we actually heard an advert for her place on LoveFM. Too cool. We knew her before she became famous!

After lunch, we went back toward Frank's, stopping at the marketplace to buy some fruits and veggies from Peter and Sylvia at their stall in the market. From there, we picked up the salmon and headed back home to Tony's place.

We sat around talking about our accomplishments for the morning, and then decided to have some wonderful chocolate cake Miss June had packed up for us.Yummers!

Well, by that time, it was time for a nap. That was going well till my phone rang. It was Vasco Windows and Doors, letting me know my doors for the well house and trash bin were done, but they wanted to know what color I wanted them painted. They had them all primed and ready to paint.

I jumped in the Isuzu and headed there to see the doors and to let them know they couldn't install them till Friday because the roof forms wouldn't be coming out till Friday morning.

the Well House Door

the Garbage Bin Door, Both All Primed and Ready to Go

BTW, doors will be painted black. I can't wait for them to be installed. Then, all we need to do is get the damned transformer in and we can have the electrician set up a plug or two for the well pump, etc. Then the projects to that point will be DONE!

Now, Elsie is preparing some mango salsa for supper. We'll be eating about six-ish. Want to join us?