Triumph?!

We have beds! and a wardrobe! and Crosby is coming on Saturday!

These are all good things.

We mixed up a Lime Wash (according to Lauren's expert studio art and general know-how recommendation) and ta-da! It solved most of our lime plaster cracking issues. So...

Our spare bedroom is actually just as legit as any fancy schmancy millionaire home in the Good Ol' US of A. Sort of.

Which is a damn good thing considering the Polar winds have been unrelenting for the past several days. I think knowing I'm so close to the North Pole makes it colder than it actually is. Envisioning winds blowing of the ice cap and swirling into my house makes me shiver.

Although, Vindication has been dappled lightly with a brush of fine golden hairs upon my toiling broiling no longer dark creamy tanned brow. The thermal mass principles that we have been banking on to help heat our home actually work! Although, this has mainly to do with the walls (which we didn't do, they were already there) has rewarded our staunch stubbornness against bulldozing the place. Our kitchen was warm last evening, thanks to no fire, electrical aid, warm water bottles, or any supernatural event. It was simply that our 3 foot thick stone walls baked all day in the (freezing) sun and absorbed absorbed absorbed all that sunshiny goodness and radiated the heat back into our little abode all evening. It was miraculous. It was still cold, but not quite as cold. And that's quite a difference.

We also saw crazy dog yesterday and were overjoyed to see him. You will recall that there are many stray dogs around Buncrana and we had early on taken to naming them all. Crazy dog is the stray dog that runs into the middle of the road inches in front of speeding bumpers and nips at hubcaps, open windows, wiper blades anything. We have even seen him take on large Cement trucks. This dog is, in a word, crazy.

We hadn't seen him in a long time, and we thought, since a young boy had been bitten by a stray dog some time in early September that the strays had been rounded up and killed, since most of our usual strays were not to be found. However, cunning Crazy Dog, obviously, laid low until the stray dog killing had abated before rearing his formidable, patchy coated awkward gangly mug. Long live Crazy Dog.

Ugh, so tired today. We worked from 4pm to 11pm yesterday trying to prep the room for the furniture delivery and on only one meal the whole day long. So after throwing our freezing cold nubbins of hands up in the air and calling it quits after several long hours working by headlamp (including me heaving buckets of cement at least a third of my weight along our roof (no small feat by headlamp in tennis shoes on a tin roof)), we had missed all the local eating establishments, and also the grocers. So, no food for us last night. We then headed for the next best thing: Guinness. In addition, our friend was playing music again and so we needed to go see him. So, after 3 pints I felt sufficiently full enough to walk home and pass out. Brian on the other hand had the delight of trying 55 year old Whiskey. Yeah. Not something you find often, at least not in the States. He was rather pleased.

Wonderful. Well that's probably it for now, hopefully I'll get a video or some photos up soon of the new room etc. At the very least, I'll have some great photos of a killer holiday up in a week and a half. For those who celebrate it, have a fantastic Halloween. Awesome. later.

Erratic Indeed

So I'm fine today. and actually was fine pretty soon after leaving the library yesterday.

the sun is shining but its pretty cold. We suspect that there was frost last night. It was pretty cold. We are still moving along with sealing up the walls, it's taking longer than we thought but it's coming along. Hopefully by the week's end we'll have doorways that are sealed and walls that keep us warm. Potentially, we could even have beds and a closet. How exciting. Otherwise, not much is happening that I haven't already mentioned.

My reading has slowed and started to retrace itself. I've learned through several disappointing starts that just because a book wins a prize doesn't in any way mean it's good or worth reading. I read a novel given to me by a friend here that actually was quite good, it was written by Lionel Shriver and it's entitled "We need to talk about Kevin", it's kind of an interesting read. A little sad, but those books are often the best kind. I requested Henry James' "The Golden Bowl" one of my throwbacks to ID1 freshman year, from the library but it has yet to arrive. Bummer.

I'm dreaming of warm weather like always and Brian and I have been pretty concerned over the warm weather in Southern California. The fires there, all we can gather, are devastating. We expect the Federal Goverment is taking a bit more pro-active approach after their embarrassing and inexcusable debacle in New Orleans. I'm seriously looking forward to the weekend which hasn't happened in a while. It's somewhat refreshing. So much to do, so little time. Haven't felt like that in a while though. Funny how self-imposed deadlines can be as serious if not more serious that external deadlines.

I got to shower today. And it felt great. The rats have kept away recently, not sure why, because there is still food around (although not as much, heh.). We've had cows deposited on the land now. Which is, well, really not a problem at all, just somewhat inconvenient. We can no longer take relaxing breaks on our porch or enjoy the good view from our land. awesome.

But with a whiff of the end in the air, moods and hopes improve. And yet, it's still quite a ways from the end. But I don't like to think of that. I'll be flying solo all too soon.

I don't feel like putting a title

So it's Tuesday.

The library is open again and so I have internet access again. My lime plaster keeps cracking and I've been trying to troubleshoot all weekend. We found a bunk bed set for a good price and I think it will take care of our bed issues. My second air mattress popped. Somehow Brian's is still working just fine...

Our doors are ridiculously thick and heavy and extremely narrow. Every time I'm in a good mood and think about it I laugh, you can just tell the personality going into this house. Tall skinny doors. It will be difficult to fit any sort of cumbersome furniture into the house (by the nature of the adjective) but also because with such narrow doorways, there is little room to maneuver.

My moods are becoming more erratic. It's time to leave. Money is stressful even when it isn't an issue. A trait I am not happy about inheriting.

Cusp: what a funny word.

Today's word is cusp. Because Brian and I are on it. the one between our shack becoming a partial home. one might call it...a halfway house.

we have been plastering walls and putting in doorframes, hanging doors, drilling handles and locks into said doors and really making this place not bad...I bought a medium sized wardrobe for the spare bedroom, we've got a couple beds in waiting and we're experimenting with ceiling designs.

As for the kitchen, it's the next room to get sealed up where the stove will then truly keep a warm hearth. We may even splurge and find a few chairs and a small coffee (ahem, quarters) table. I am so impressed and excited with the house has done such a turn around. The plaster and doors make all the difference. We actually have one room that locks! As my cousin Ryan says (in a ridiculous french accent) "Can you eemagine?"

It is also a week countdown to the arrival of the Messiah. Score. So, I'll keep this short and sweet, I uploaded some pictures (as you all undoubtedly saw) to tide you all over until a longer report comes. And I'm sure you're all as anxious to see the pictures of the new house as I am to post them. Everyone. Have a good weekend.

Sunset Photos

Hello Again

Brian and I have been busy. We are putting on doors, sealing up the walls and generally making the house ready to be partly furnished and also capable of hibernating until my visa status is refreshed. So it's been busy busy busy. We also have a workcrew from Dublin excited to come up and help us out, it's all who you know and social networking has it's benefits. Free labor for a weekend, awesome. I'm excited to meet most of them considering I don't really know who they are, friend of a friend, of a friend...etc.

Several sets of hands will be of great help in this final push toward securing a safe domain. I hope we have enough tools. Seeing how much we accomplished with Jake here helping out is a good measure of how productive we can be when it's not just brian and I. I also am desperately looking forward to our vacation. Brian had a nice vacation with his parents and seems to have returned to the site refreshed. I on the other hand, have been here forever, I've spent a total of 3 days not living on site since arriving at the end of July. And frankly, I am in need of a change of scenery. It will be nice to put the project on hold and out of mind for a short bit before returning for a final lockdown.

The weather has been cold at night (and during the day) hovering between 4 degrees Celsius at night and well, the thermometer says low teens during the day, but I think it's single digits. Depends if you're in the sun or in the gigantic shadow of a cloud. It also has taken to periodically dusting the area with enough mist to wet everything around and then become sunny again. It seems to be personally trying to annoy, which, mission accomplished. It makes me recall the monk yelling at the inclement weather in Holy Grail.

As for Post-Ireland, I have many many ideas floating around in my head that I've tested out on some people and generally trying to figure what I want/can (to) do. This is difficult because everything is contingent and the factors keep changing. So it's difficult to settle on a plan. We'll see what happens. What else?

Not much. I'm excited about buying beds. For the spare bedroom (the room we are currently working on) I'd like to put a double bed and a twin bed in there. I think that would be nice and since we raised the walls and roof height a considerable amount the room will be plenty big. I put a hold on a nice wooden wardrobe that I can't wait to put in the room. It'd be nice if it was just finished already! Furnishing a home is much much more fun than trying to renovate one. It's like a puzzle. Looking at a floorplan and thinking how you can fit all these odd shaped pieces in there. But I guess I've never been a fan of puzzles.

We're excited to play with lime today. Lime is considered a natural material (well it is) and has much less embodied energy than cement or concrete. In addition, lime is breathable much more breathable than concrete making it a much better building material. (It does shock me that much of the natural building movement and world is SO much better for the environment and rarely is it any more inconvenient to use than 'traditional' materials, it even out performs many traditional materials, and yet, nobody wants to use it, and somehow the Cement and PVC industries just have a stranglehold on the market. IT'S RIDICULOUS) So, with that backstory, we're even more excited to start working with Lime. It comes in bags just like cement, and its a fine powder. Since we'll be making a plaster/putty as a first coast and then a wash as a final coat we don't need to buy any aggregate (like you must when making concrete). It also is a 'fun' activity, playing with putty? Cmon! Smearing it all over walls? Yes, please. Takes me back to the good ol' days. So, we're excited. for the third time. Plus, it will lend a great white aesthetic to the inside walls (we'll save the exterior for some other time). I'm thinking it will look fantastic.

Well enough talk about it, I'm going to go get started. Hope everyone is having a wonderful hump day. (actually, yours hasn't started really yet. Good Luck, anyway.

Two Plus Jake's a Crowd

So I have been rejoined by my hip Global health Dubliner and my wayward traveling companion and we are setting again ourselves to the task of doing something to this house. How nice it is to have company again.

I finished the book I was reading. and it was quite good. There's nothing like a good sad story. I can't wait til the arrival of my Norweigan Wood book...it's fantastic.

Not really much to report. Yesterday was normal I suppose, did some work, putzed around. it was a friday, and the weather wasn't that great. i was dismayed that the local supermarket carried only cheddar, or slices of gouda...sigh. I also could use a kitchen, proper kitchen. hmmm. my tan is completely gone which also is terrific and I haven't showered all week. but, on the positive side....i'm not dead I guess. hah.

gosh i'm boring. i almost caught a rat yesterday, can't say I was trying too hard, but I did get really pissed off at it. and had it trapped in a bag for a while. but i couldn't really bring myself to do anything to it. i listened to some music. i'm getting bored of my music, but that does not mean i'll attempt the radio again.

i don't know what to do with the next 2 years of my life.

Today I Read a Book

....and that's about it.

I pulled myself together reluctantly to make the trip into the library to post to my loyal readers, sigh. Because to be honest, mindlessly nibbling on tootsie rolls (thanks nanny!) was getting me along just fine laying in bed next to a cold fire. Cruised through something like 400 pages though. Ye-hah.

My running shoes stink. And I haven't been able to run in a while because my left hamstring is slowly tearing to ribbons. fuck. should've dealt with this a year and a half ago.

i had a lot of run around thoughts today but decided to settle on 'tired of life' which is a familiar conclusion when I run around with my thoughts too much. And, since I know I'm not really, I settle for, I'm just tired.

consider this the point where the paramedics have been doing CPR for a while on the car crash victim to the point where you want something else to happen, and each chest pump seems to be trying to drag life out of a long dead subject. Maybe there'll be more tomorrow.

Blah.

So another night and day has passed. It was beautiful today here on Inishowen. I picked up a book from a friend and began to read it. It's pretty good. And its one of those books that makes me reflect. my favorite kind.

some times i think all that goes through my head is just a bunch of rubbish. and other times i'm overwhelmed with tragedy at not being able to record it all. and this cliche popped into my mind. are only the evil so preoccupied with being good? Agh, ugh, blah. I'll probably spend the rest of the night reading this book. Excellent.

The spare bedroom is coming along although, not surprisingly, work goes more slowly with only one person. And especially when that one person is me. I won't be alone long enough to kick this moping and start being productive though, which leaves nothing but unexplainable lacking results that feed my own guilt and self-chiding. damn.

i also came to the conclusion that i have yet still too many emotional reservations to be able to write the candid unapologetic book that I'm craving to write. I still have too many hold-outs and hopes of changing the plot and creating the story I wish to tell, I am not yet at a point where I can look at my life and experiences (thus far, haha) with the fond recollection of a quaint story at a distant. not that those adjectives should describe my story to anyone but me. and another revelation, one that came a while ago, but i never really felt like being this public about, but eh, what the hell, most people would peg it on me already. my vanity is not so much that I wish to write a harrowing ground breaking heart rending novel of the ages as much as I want someone to write a harrowing ground breaking heart rending novel of the ages about me. sooo, yeah. not quite at the point where I can write unapologetically. Hah. Although, I'm practicing, see.

Is it strange that I long for old age and yet am absolutely in utter rejection of surrendering my youth? It just seems fitting I suppose. Somehow. Hmmm...I think I'd rather go read my book than continue this. Too much feeling of intrusion by everything, even my own thoughts. I need the story to concentrate upon.

being a man of a thousand hats and yet unable to escape a defining one is simultaneously my saving grace and my damning curse. hahaha, that's ridiculous.

happy hump day again.

as time goes by....


(great song).

I am a Rock, I am an Island...

So, Brian and his parents left to go travel and I am here to continue working on the house but its raining. It's a good thing I put up the gutters yesterday. I was sort of in a blue funk the whole day yesterday, sort of doing work, sort of stoking the fire, sort of cleaning up in general. Finally I gave up and decided to indulge me solitary mood and stoked the fire quite large and simply sat in front of it listening to music. Then it began to rain. Perfect. I actually fell asleep, mainly because I was hungry and didn't have any food in the house and didn't feel like walking to get some. It was a strange mood, I didn't feel like working, sleeping, cleaning, walking, sitting, listening to all the different music I tried listening to...i simply didn't want to do anything. And yet, deep down, I know I was enjoying it, somehow. Then since I hadn't moved in forever, the rats began to snoop around the place. One large one came in through the window and nonchalantly went about a search for food, only stopping seldom to sniff the air and throw a glance in my direction. He knew I posed no threat, and I'm pretty sure I didn't either. I didn't feel like harrassing a rat.

Then somewhere, the squeaks of the rats insisted on disturbing the rhythm of the music and the crackle of the fire. I was envious that they had someone to talk to, not that I felt like talking to anyone. Stupid rats.

I finally gave up and decided to walk into town. I had been haphazardly watching the clock, waiting for it to get late enough to justify cracking a beer. I know, I know, I don't need any excuse, it's 5 o'clock somewhere, but I was also alone. So the two cancel each other out and I was justified in drinking a beer, as long as it was an appropriate time. So I drank a beer and walked into town for some food. I brought my book. Hegel. But since it was a lecture series, it didn't have that conversational type dynamic like literature...I should have brought a novel. You can't talk to someone lecturing you about Art, Philosophy of Religion, and the History of Philosophy. So I put him down and just focused on my sandwich.

Not feeling like walking home yet, I walked next door to the bar and stepped in to watch some TV. To my disappointment the bar was practically empty, I guess I shouldn't have expected more from a bar at 7 oclock on a Monday. "You must be bored stupid," remarked the bartender. And indeed I am I thought to myself. So I lingered, dragging out two drinks until they were exhausted before frowning at the growing downpour and walking home in the dark and the rain.

I was bored, walking between the streetlights, but when I walked under them and through the night seemed perfect. Walking home in the dark and with the rain. alone. now that seemed fitting. alone in a bar or at a worksite or any other place actually just seemed pathetic and disorienting. I felt right, walking home in the night.

I went to bed around 10:30 and woke up periodically to the gnawing of rats on something plastic. I would struggle out of bed, wearily and drearily survey our 'kitchen table' for the poor victim of the rats to find nothing and get back in bed. Just as I was falling asleep again, the gnawing would commence. Getting back up I put everything that had plastic on it in our cast iron pot. Still, I heard scratching. Can't these rats go to bed! So I stoked the fire, turned on some music to drown out the rats and fell asleep, trying to shake the image of the two gigantic spiders mating by the salt and pepper out of my mind.

Waking up to rain on a tin roof (as Norah Jones' song goes) is not as romantic without the second half of that lyric (while I'm safe there in your arms). In fact, it means I have to put off work, the one thing that can give me some alternative to moping.

So here I am in the library, recounting the past day to anonymous (I guess not entirely) readers and waiting for the sky to clear. Somebody's got a case of the Monday's....on a Tuesday.

Busy Busy Busy

So, I said I wouldn't do it again, but that apparently proved to be untrue. I'm sorry. But Brian's parents arrived and not only put us up in a hotel (unbelievably nice) but also took us traveling on Sunday. Excellent, since we haven't really traveled outside of a 5 mile radius from our house. So we went to see Giant's Causeway, a World Heritage Site, which was really really cool. It was great to just sit on the rocks (as amazing as they were) and just watch, listen and smell the surf break. We have the Lough right here and it's the ocean, but its not THE ocean, which I miss. But in addition, to Plunkett's arrival and departure, we put up the second quarter of the roof and so we now have half the house re-roofed. This is great. It's going to be the spare bedroom eventually, but it will become the main bedroom soon. as soon as we get beds that is. Awesome.

It's been crazy the whirlwind which has been the last few days. i am exhausted, exhausted exhausted. And let's be honest. Anxiously awaiting my vacation that is fast approaching with a purveyor of the good life, straight from Bay Area. i want to stay here forever and finish this house but I also want to leave right now. I'm exploring all my options. i guess I could elaborate more on what's been going on, but I just can't think of anything important. I haven't entertained any big notions lately, mainly because I've been pretty absorbed in my tasks here and too tired to do anything but pass out when they are completed. But I think this coming week will give me plenty of time to do some thinking/reflection, while continuing to shape up the house before another visitor. Drop me a line and take care.

Threes a Crowd

Hello all, back.

So Dublin was great. It was a great thing to get away for a while. On the long bus ride back I was actually getting really excited to get back to Buncrana and my sleeping bag...weird? But we're back and the furry boys have moved in with us (rats). So that's cool. But I can't say I care that much, I'd rather live with them than be a Nazi about food sequestration with myself. So yeah. Everybody's welcome, birds, rats, spiders, earwigs, Plunkett. Hahah.

Hanging out with Jake (he and his roomate threw a 'Welcome to America' party) was great and really great to go explore the city with people who actually grew up there. Well we didn't really explore the city with them, but we did hang out with them at the party and then watched the Rugby World Cup game (Ireland needs some help (only slightly less so than America, sheesh)) France must have genetically engineered players (they are unbelievably large specimens of the human race). And Argentina's not too shabby either. Anyway, we saw the National Gallery on the last day to kill time before the bus departed. It was great, I had been missing art, so so much. It was great to walk around and well, I guess jump back into a world I'm more familiar with. It was nice. So yeah. I really really love Velasquez. Baller.

But we're back here and the weather has become fickle again. Bummer but with renewed vigor we plan on pushing through. Its funny to observe how excited, giddy and childlike Brian and I are showing Adam our home. Its funny to have such a sense of pride about the place. But I guess I had already identified a desire to show my old world my new world. Welp, I guess I was right on there. Let's see what else?

The visa issue is still not settled, although we learned a bit more about it. I may not be able to stay as long as I thought...so the house may take a raincheck until the summer again. Which, isn't the worst thing. Hah. I hear Los Angeles is nice this time of year...

Alright, so I fail at being interesting, updating and informative. Damn. I am having difficulty deciding what to do next with my life. I am ready to go home, I'm ready to try something new and I suppose I'd be ready to stay here a bit longer. But what to do? There's a lot of things I'd like to do before going back across the Atlantic. Who knows...but I need to decide fairly soon. Bummer. I miss my team and my Claremont a lot. But I'm not sure it's the place for me anymore. Got to let go at some point right? But it'd be nice to take little tastes every now and then of the past, no?

Dublin's a cool city. But I'd need to spend more time there. The green space is really well done in the city too. I was impressed. Really great parks. Alright, well I'm being kind of lame. So I'll check in laterrrrr.