the sliding floor

Today we finished the floors.

the art of laying concrete

We are three hours work away from finishing all the groundworks.

We've done a full day today - our first for over a week, given so many rainy days.

Between times we've managed a few half days only. We hit 299.5 bags of cement this afternoon. Only another 24 or so to go on the floors.

Two middle aged self builders, me with arthritis in both hips and with dodgy knees and Jayne with trapped nerves and both of us waking up with pins and needles in both arms, have mixed about 110 tonnes of aggregate and 20 tonnes of cement - that's 800 bags offloaded and piled into the mixers. We have laid almost 250 square metres of concrete floors and over 100 running metres of concrete footings. We've taken a full 12 months, but the concreting has taken less than four weeks actual work - though rain has stopped play quite frequently. No taking the quick way out with teams of groundworkers, ready mixed concrete and pumps placing it exactly where needed. Just the two of us. A hand mixer, a pan mixer, two rakes and a wheelbarrow but just the two of us plus Adam barrowing for just one day. We're chuffed to bits.

goodbye and thanks for all the fish

Last day on the fish farm today. At least it rained both yesterday and today so I didn't miss any concreting time. I've done casual and relief work there for two and a half years but as it is the worst paid of my jobs and becoming increasingly difficult to fit in alongside the build it had to go. It has over 750,000 salmon and produces over 4,000 tonnes of fish each cycle. The work is pretty physical and often involves long and thankless shifts at short notice. My longest shift was 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. harvesting- and that with barely a break. Also worked 7 p.m. to 7.a.m. when we were grading which was actually a lovely starry night. I've been fortunate in being able to sample the product fresh and it is pretty good. All fish should be slightly undercooked, but I find it hardest to undercook salmon for some reason. Like yacht deliveries (another job I've done in my 50s) it is really a young man's job. Not sure if I'll miss it or not as I really like working on the sea.

X67 RIP

Had to scrap the car today. Can someone tell me if the fact that a timing belt failure is almost always fatal for an engine is deliberate designed in obsolescence or just a failure in engineering. Why should one bit of rubber cause a whole car to have to be scrapped ? Actually it was the idler - but the same principle.

It had done 162000 miles and some bits will be recycled. Salvaged fuel, towing hitch and battery.

still raining. still dreaming reprise

After two days of high winds and driving rain we have another three or four days rough weather to come before we can get on to finish our floors. Mixed blessing as it gives us a bit of time to recover. We need three full days and a half to finish off. Almost 250 bags cement used about 90 to go. Missed the fine weather window a few weeks ago as I was on the fish for the last fine weekend - but my last weekend on the fish farm is coming up.

concrete wellies

The weather forecast is for gales and rain for the next forty eight hours and then showers, so there is little chance we'll get any more concreting done this week. We have dodged the showers the last two days but tractor problems have meant we have only managed two half days - with extended coffee breaks during squalls. Both days we have poured two cubic metres - about 4.5 tonnes wheelbarrowed right across the big roundhouse and placed for Jayne to rake out and level. All the floors are now filled up to the reinforcing. We will still take three days to finish as we have to wheelbarrow another 9 to 10 tonnes to the west side and beyond to the sunspace. And the weather is still against us. Force 8-10 gusts tomorrow and Thursday mean the ferry will probably be off too.

The concrete won't though as low temperatures and rain water on top of what we've laid will make the cure very slow.

Both of us are suffering aches and pains so this enforced break might be a chance to recover. Jayne has pins and needles in her right arm and probably tendonitis to accompany back pain. We are both tired and our combined age of 116 means we have slowed down a little.

it was 40 years ago today....

In October 1971 we had left school and a sizeable number of us from Milford Haven went to University College London - most to do medicine and other bloodsports but I went to read Geography and Geology. So this was Fresher's Week. I joined the Rugby Club, Fencing and Geogsoc. We all eyed and sized each other up. The narrow minded English took the piss out of my Welshness - remember England had only beaten Wales at Rugby - NOT Rugger - twice in the previous 25 years. It was the Wales of Barry John and JPR Williams.

The Fresher's Ball was headlined by Mott the Hoople but I wasn't into them so didn't go.

It was the beginning of an extremely un-illustrious academic career - my own performance was a steady slide over the three years I was at UCL but the farm boy in the city certainly had fun. I took in fifty bands in my first term. That was eleven weeks of academic study.

On reflection UCL was probably the wrong place for me and the Geography department the wrong department. I did not know what I wanted to do at 18 and at 58 still don't, though I have succeeded in achieving my life's goals - except one. Those achieved were; sailing across the Atlantic, going to the Azores and landing on St Kilda. Academically, had I studied Psychology, Architecture (I loved the Bartlett), or Oceanography - all lifelong passions - then my life would have been so different but not unrecognisable as I would have probably made all the same mistakes but in a different setting. Anyway this weekend my fellow freshers - the Herne Hill Six (or 8) are hopefully enjoying themselves in Charlotte St without getting too maudlin. Mr Kwai's Chinese restaurant at the Warren St end of Tottenham Court Rd. may be no more but its memory lingers on....

the concrete fairy

As of Saturday evening we have about 62 sq m left to complete. It has rained every day since Wednesday and only one and half days work done last week, what with breakdowns and rain. We are aching all over from raking out tonnes of concrete up to 10m across the big roundhouse. We have suffered for our art. Jayne levelled the sections we have completed today and we are within a gnat's whisker of our tolerances (5-7mm across the 12m floor diameter). We have too many shrinkage cracks as it rained heavily on the wetter loads we used to tamp off with but these are mostly hairline and can be filled after the cure is complete. So our mixes ended up too wet in places. Scary though to see cracks in new concrete. All we want now is four days dry or the concrete fairy to magically pour the last third. Oh and the timing belt went on the car so our spell of good fortune continues...