Working outdoors right now is a craps shoot because of the rain, and a lot like building a house in the Dagoba system because of the humidity. Seriously — the humidity is at 65% right now, and when it’s 85 degrees farenheit, it means you will be soaked through to the skin if you move or breathe outdoors for more than 3 minutes. 

Even so, today I managed to snatch about 3 hours of work and got the East-facing side of the house caught up with the West-facing side: 

It now matches the other side. See? 

  
Can you tell the difference between what I did today and the way it was in the last post? I’ll give you a hint: look at the bottom of the trailer. 

  

This is what the East-facing side (which I worked on today) looked like in the last post:

  
It was a fair bit of work, but it only took about 3 hours. To give you some idea, here’s what I got accomplished in about the same amount of time yesterday:

  
The shingles. Not anything else — just the shingles. (Oh — and the sealing tape around the window.) To get the shingles to fit and line up side by side means climbing up and down the ladder. A LOT. Lots of up and down. See this one shingle that fits so perfectly under the right side of the window?

  
That one shingle required no less than 8 trips up and down the ladder to cut, fit, etc. As I recall, I did the other gable during the late fall and early winter when it felt great to climb up and down the ladder hundreds of times to cut and fit the shingles for the gingerbread effect. It kept me warm and it was artistically fullfilling and fun. 

In this weather — well, frankly, it sucks. 

I’m going to leave that job until it has to be done and pick it up again later on. I made the mistake of thinking I could do it after a hot yoga class yesterday morning and I was SO wrong. After 3 hours of shingle fitting, I was done. For the day. It took major coconut water to recover from that mistake. 

I was really grateful, however, for a break in the weather today — which was not expected.

I really love cedar. It’s so beautiful. Look at the different shades and patterns in the wood. There is a lot of cedar sitting in the interior of the house and it has become the dominant smell when I walk in. If the budget allows, I’m going to put cedar on the walls and ceiling indoors, too. 

  

Another thing about working outdoors in this location (besides just the humidity) is the wildlife . . .by which I mean bugs. 

They’re everywhere. 

Even if I have only just put down a stack of wood that came out of the car, when I pick it up again, there will inevitably be several creatures that accompany it onto the sawing table. In order to be non-harming, they have to be noticed and moved.  They’re the neighbors. They’re not going anywhere anytime soon. 

The mosquitoes and no-see-em’s are also neighbors that seem not to want to go anywhere anytime soon, but the tiki torches help a lot to deter their presence, as does the deep-woods bug repellent. 

Not all of the neighbors are nearly so annoying, however, and some of them are kind of cute and interesting. When I lifted the tarp to go higher with the cedar T&G today, for example, I ran into this guy again. 

  

He likes it under there. Lots of bugs to eat, as I may have mentioned already. (!) The last time I saw him, about two weeks ago, he was on the actual roof in the same location.

  
That was about 3 weeks ago, though . . .  So . . . either he grew (which they do a lot of during the summer) or it’s just a different froggie who happens to like that side of the roof. 

There’s also this ninja toad that darts around under the house:

  
He’s so quick and so black that he blends in with everything. You just see movement out of the corner of your eye and when you look again, there’s nothing there. I managed to catch him this time, however, although we wouldn’t be able to see him without the flash.

And (WARNING: Arachnophobes beware!) there is a Wolf Spider that’s become rather territorial about the scrap pile:

  
She’s pretty big, actually. But as intimidating as she looks, she’s a serious neighborhood ally alongside the frog and the toad. They all eat mosquitoes and bugs, so as far as I’m concerned they’re part of the team. Wolf spiders are pretty harmless, too, and gentle natured, apparently. 

Unless they don’t want you messing with their wood pile. 

Ah, well. We all have priorities. 

And we all have nuissance neighbors, too, right? 

Well — aside from the mosquitoes, there are Vandal Squirrels. They are into destroying all kinds of stuff and aren’t nearly as happy to share space as the rest of the neighborhood. I don’t understand these little bastards, but I need to get a door installed ASAP to keep them at bay. Here’s what they did to my sweet little fairy lights: 

  
I’m still finding little bits and pieces of those lights around and under the house. 

I also replaced my tool belt for the second time today. The first belt was canvas with leather on it. They ate it. It was winter. I get it. They were hungry and food was likely in short supply. It doesn’t explain the lights, but still. 

The second tool belt they ate was once my dad’s. Check out what they did:

   
   
I kid you not — they did it just last night. I wore it yesterday with no problem.  

Frankly – once they start in on a tool belt, a little more disappears day by day until it’s entirely unusable, so I replaced it with this one today when I went out to get more cedar. 

  
It’s not canvas and its’s not leather or suede, so I’m hoping they’ll leave it alone. I’ll leave the other leather one out so they can eat it, and hopefully be distracted away from my new tool belt, which I’d like to use. 

Presently, there is also a squatter in the tiny house, which is another reason to get the door put on sooner rather than later. I had to use my flash to get this next picture because it’s dark and overcast outside, and there aren’t any lights in there yet. When I went into the house today to gather tools, etc, I moved some wood against the wall and the “squatter” went flying out. 

  
The ladder was outdoors at the time or I would’ve climed up into the loft to get a look in there since it’s right next to the loft. 

I’ve decided that as long as there are no eggs, the squatter is OUT.  I’ll be going in tomorrow even if it rains to finish installing angle ties at various joints throughout the house, so I’ll get a chance to look in on it. 

If there are eggs in there, however. . . well, I’ll probably let her stay and get the little ones seen to until they’re independent. . . and THEN — the whole lot of them are out. 

(If that’s the case, you’ll be getting lots of updates about the “renters”.)

*sigh*

Although it’s pretty awesome all told, the whole truth has to include serious physical discomfort of the kind that would make most people really cranky, unhappy, uncomfortable, and resentful — which is why I don’t invite over many helpers. Assuming it were possible to plan around the rain so as to avoid jerking around someone’s schedule for days or weeks at at time, they’d still be coming over to “help” in really uncomfortable conditions that would be untenable for someone with a low tolerance for bugs and creepie-crawlies.  Because they’re everywhere. 

Remember how cranky Luke Skywalker got when he was stuck in the Dagoba system visiting Yoda? Remember how there were things crawling over everything and it was really damp and humid and mucky? Well, that’s not far from the truth of what it’s like down there right now. I may not be training to be a Jedi Knight under these conditions (which would make anyone cranky — let’s face it), but building a house in it is definitely a Jedi lesson of sorts. Many things will look easy after this. 

I don’t mind the creepie-crawlies and non-vandalizing neighbors so much, but the biting insects combined with the heat and humidity make for a pretty uncomfortable day’s work. I just pulled a tick (attached!) out of my hair as I was writing this, in fact. 

There’s really no option but to accept the terms and conditions, and do your best if you have no choice, which is what I do. Most of the time it doesn’t bother me too much. But if I had a choice, I’d probably choose to go to the pool or do something else that’s less uncomfortable. 

Also, it’s fine if I’m just managing my own work and discomfort; I usually even enjoy it now. After the springtime clean-out of the creek culvert a few weeks ago, most outdoor jobs look pretty good by comparison. That was a hot, dirty job that would likely have given Mike Rowe a run for his money. Fortunately, we got to it before all of the heavy rains started up, or the resulting flooding would’ve been seriously problematic for us and our neighbors. I’m really, really glad we did this when we did; if we’d waited any longer I’m not sure how it would’ve gotten done. We caught a brief moment when there wasn’t any water in the creek on that side, and the culvert was completely blocked over with heaps of leaves, branches and even a 15 foot tree — all of which had come from upstream. Armed with pitchforks and gloves, Dad and I dove in. Here’s the before picture: 

  
I don’t have an after picture, but perhaps I should get a “current” one for comparison. With all the rain we’ve had here over the last month, I’m so grateful that we’re not confronting problems with flooding. So many people are right now. We also have the fortune not to be confronted with drought, for which I am also grateful. 

So for the mean time, I’m pretty happy pretending to be Luke Skywalker in the Dagoba system with my very own version of an R2 unit. But most of you know him as Noah.  He’s pretty good company, actually, and never complains, unlike the real R2D2. 

Noah spends most of the day just like this:

  

It makes him about as useful as R2D2 was in a similar environment, but much cuter and no sass. Small breaks to throw his ball again make him soooooo happy! They’ve become little opportunities to check in, be mindful, and reconnect to what’s all around. Noah’s always been the most effective, loving mindfulness teacher. No joke.

 As I write this, indoors, clean and dry, the weather radio is going nuts and now it looks like this outside:

  

So much to be grateful for.