Hump Day At Casa Winjama

Started the day off right at 5:30 AM, with an invigorating walk with the girls. Four-and-a-half miles, plus some short stops for pee breaks for the girls, picking up mail at the Post Office (Deeohgee hit the jackpot with two complete absentee voter information packets from Washington State),
and a stop to pick up some meat pies for breakfast, and back home in under an hour and fifteen minutes.

I said she hit the jackpot, because those packets were huge, so she knew she was carrying something important.

We Did It Over A Week Ago!

Of course, the fact that Dianna and I had already voted a week-and-a-half ago (24 September, 2016) by email never entered into the discussion. I think Deeohgee could have cared less one way or another.

More Chain Boards Going Up

This is an exciting part of the construction. For some reason, it seems like this is really moving ahead fast, maybe because it's so visual.

Douglas Mounting Form Boards

What Douglas is fastening to the columns is the wood board that anchors the rest of the chain form. Well, the sticks help support it when those get installed, but this is the first bit that holds things up.

Indir and Erwin Cutting Form Boards

They're cutting the boards that make up the chain form. It's all pretty dense and heavy mahogany. Cutting is no easy task. It takes its toll on saw blades and saw motors. You can hear it as they cut. The motors really strain. No, it's not because they don't know how to use the tools, it's because the wood is very dense and very hard. Also, it's green, for several reasons. One, so they can cut it, and two, so it can be nailed and flex to hold the concrete when that's added. Otherwise, if the wood was dry or seasoned, it's doubtful that they'd be making near as much progress as they are.

Markup Begins for Accessibility Ramps

The beginning of marking stuff up to build the ramps. The ramps will essentially be mirrors of each other at either end of the pool deck. They will give Dianna easy access to the patio and to the parking area. She hasn't been able to get down to the patio since her accident, so once the ramps are operational, the area she can access easily will have increased dramatically. Besides, the patio has always been one of her favorite places to hang out, and I know she misses it.

Chain In Position on East Side

Things continue to move at a rapid pace. I didn't even know the steel had been moved into place till I stuck my head out of the kitchen sliding doors and, there it was. I'm hoping I can catch this next on as it goes into place. I have no idea how they do that.

Looks Like a Roman Aqueduct

Here's another shot of the East side steel. From this angle, it really does look like a Roman aqueduct.

Next up, I'm guessing, will be the form sides and bracing, then pour.

High-Wire Act

I had never really thought about it before, but traversing over the span of the chain is necessary to get things aligned correctly. Here's our performers venturing along the high-waire to ensure it's seated correctly.

Fastening the Sticks

Before the steel gets positioned, the sticks making up the forest have to be cut to length and fastened to the bottom form board.

Here - Catch This!

Did I say 'High-wire act?' Well, let's liven it up a little bit. Try tossing pliers back and forth, well, at least one way anyway. Daniel, on the right, almost took a header off the perch, reaching to retrieve the pliers tossed by Endher. End of the workday hijinks!

Vote, Voting, Voted

We cast our ballots painlessly by email. We no longer have to snail-mail our paper ballots back in. Yea! Some things improve, some don't.

Yessir! We Sure Did!

How I envy the British and the Canadians (and probably others as well). They only allow political ads for thirty days before a called election. My how refreshing that would be.

I'll trust that someone will win, perhaps with both the popular as well as the Electoral College vote. So, enough of that drivel. I'm tired of polls and pundits. Period.

Vote Early And Vote Often

That's just a great quote - I think from the late Mayor of Chicago, Richard Daly. Well, if he didn't really say it, he probably meant to. For me, once is enough, thank you.

As Expats we get to do some things just a bit differently than folks up north. For instance, voting...

Washington state even allows you to email your ballot in. We downloaded the ballot and an affidavit form which also is a waiver of secrecy. We filled out our ballots, filled out and signed the affidavit, created a PDF for each of the 7 pages of our ballots and form, then emailed the PDF to the Thurston County Auditor's Office.

What could be easier - well, other than voting online? Of course, we still have to snail-mail our paper ballot and affidavit, but that doesn't have to arrive til like November 25, 2008! Pretty cool I must say.

In talking with Mae and Craig (who vote as Oregon residents), apparently, not every state has a vote-by-email feature, so I guess they're pretty progressive up there in the other Washington.

Yes Indeedy! We did...

Does it make a difference? Voting, that is... Who knows? I feel better having done it. Now, since we've voted, the system will know that and all the political ads on TV, etc., will magically disappear. Right? R-i-g-h-t... (I actually had more fun making the graphic than voting).

Now, about Saturday's work on the deck and other things. Well, the guys made a lot of progress on the deck. It's now about a third completed, including the access hatch, which looks pretty cool with the pattern reversed.

Here's John Supervising the Woodwork

It's really looking good, and big too. It should be really nice for relaxing on, sunbathing, reading, etc., all at the same time, with plenty of room so as not to bash into each other while doing it.

The Cool Access Hatch

Around the Spa

The Other Direction

Two-Thirds Yet to Go

The drain work Cody had been working on, is all done. He installed a 3" pipe, running to the canal, with joins for the pool French drain alongside two sides of the pool, pool overflow, pool filter back-flush and one round floor drain more or less in the middle of the back garden area towards the canal. This should help keep things nice and dry.

Cody's Drain Work Is All Done

Also, as a safety measure, I hired Sammy, a guy who had done a lot of work for Mae and Craig on their property across the street, to chop most of the lot next door to us.

Sammy Chopping the Defensible Fire Perimeter

I'm hoping to accomplish two things, one - to create more of a fire-break in case we have another burn, and two - to provide less of a hidden area for shady characters to do whatever they do, not that we've had problems with that - just once. But that's enough. We'll nip it in the bud, "right now" (with "right now" in the Gringo sense, not the Belizean sense).

Eustace Hard At It

I've asked Sammy to leave the medicinal and ornamental plants and trees and to get rid of all the "pie-zen" wood, as they say and other bad plants. He's hired two other guys to work with him on it. They'll be done by this afternoon. He also hired Eustace, a local art wood carver who owns a chain saw, to whack some of the larger poison wood trees. As you can see, the cleared areas really make a difference. They'll be able to burn the debris in about two or three weeks - depending on rain.

A Nice Cleared Fire-Break

And, finally, have a happy "Pan-American Day". It's a national holiday here in Belize, celebrated today and tomorrow as most offices, etc., will be closed. I think it used to be known as Columbus Day, but in the words of the song "Columbus" by Burning Spear:

I and I old I know
I and I old I say
I and I reconsider
I and I see upfully that
Christopher Columbus is a dam blasted liar
Christopher Columbus is a dam blasted liar
Yes Jah

He's saying that, he is the first one
who discover Jamaica
I and I say that,
What about the Arawak Indians and the few Black man
Who were around here, before him
The Indians couldn't hang on no longer
Here comes first Black man and woman and children,
In a Jam Down Land ya
A whole heap of mix up and mix up
A whole heap a ben up, ben up,
We have fi straighten out,
Christopher Columbus is a dam blasted liar
Christopher Columbus is a dam blasted liar
Yes Jah

He's not held in any high regard by the indigenous peoples in the Caribbean. My opinion is somewhat mixed. I think I side more with the people's sentiments than that of the "colonial downpressor mon".