Waterproofing

Hello again. I'm a little late starting this evening because I just ate an awesome spanish omelette with salad on the side as I was starving when I got back from taking the men so without further delay I'm going to crack on into it.

The sun makes an entrance

I slept really well last night, after I stopped trying to splat the ninja mosquitoes which I kept having right in my targets and after I whacked them they'd dodge and fly off. I woke at 6 and snoozed until about 6.10 when I remembered that I had to get fuel for Lucy so I couldn't lay around in bed. The sun was up and looking gorgeous while I was feeding the boys and again it was a really easy session, though also again Ralf did leave half of his breakfast. Today I have put his bowl in the fridge and I will just give it back to him tomorrow; he is not becoming a fussy eater while I am feeding him - he has wolfed all of these tins down before and Rambo has no problems so no chance of me giving in on this.

Dog poo print

As I was entering their enclosure I did a double take. Yesterday there had been the largest pile of dog poo from Rambo that I had ever seen and right on the path that goes from the gate to their house. Today, it was gone. Completely. See. This is evidence (if you didn't believe me) of how quickly the ants remove dog poo. Incredible. Anyway, I'm sure that was more than you expected to see but it astounded me. I wish I'd taken a picture of the turd yesterday now. Onwards. After feeding I hung the washing out that had been in the machine last night, keeping Rambo sat and waiting while I did it, while Ralf went to the wall and sat in the shadow as well.

Passing up the guttering

It was a bit later than expected when I left for the petrol station but somehow I still arrived dead on time to the men's village where they were sat at their table drinking coffee as usual. A few things struck me to mention this morning. First of all, their village is very multi-country. They have cars from Belgium, Germany, Turkey and Bulgaria always parked in the centre. My village only really gets about three cars full stop. Secondly, and this is awesome, there is a guy in the village who has only got one leg. He drives around not in a mobility scooter but on a petrol quad bike. Now that is what you call not letting anything stop you. Anyway, when we got back I went in to make my breakfast of bacon and eggs on the nice fresh bread (I had got more bacon out for this) and the men got on with their work. Today they were finishing off the roof on this side of the house (so no "progress" shot today as it hasn't changed from that angle) and I watched as Orhan passed the guttering up to Bekir who was on the roof.

The Mokava goes up

They had moved their rope and pulley system round to the sun terrace and after the guttering they used the rope to wrap around a sheet of the Mokava (the thin boards) and haul it up to the roof. By this time it was Sally who was positioned on the roof accepting the deliveries. It didn't take long before enough boards had been lifted to satisfy them so Orhan headed up to the roof and they cracked on.

Julian ready for re-registering

After eating my breakfast I did the first task on my list today which was to move Julian ready for taking into town tomorrow to get his new plates. He started first time (as I knew he would) and I was able to easily reverse him onto the parking area where he is sitting now ready and waiting. I need to dig out a first aid kit and a warning triangle (I had loads of these for the journey over but they all seem to have vanished?) and then I hope he sails through the inspection and is all done in a day. No new lights, please.

Lettuce seedlings

I then returned to my desk, sent her off to get to work, and headed out myself for the watering round which was a great pleasure today with both the boys being super excited, really energetic, but also obedient which is really what I want. I love them running around, chasing each other and being playful - it makes me so happy to watch and be part of it. Before any of this happened, though, I water and snapped a picture of the windowsill lettuce which is still doing well. The rest of the round was standard, though I did spend a few minutes going over the front 'lawn' again as more weeds had grown all over it. They get up so fast!

Guttering being fitted

When I got back from doing the watering round the men were fitting the guttering already. This is the first piece to go in so I'm glad I caught it for the camera. It looks nice and I'm really glad I went for the metal option, though as my Special Guest commented, I do hope it doesn't rust and I may need to work out a way to clean it out every now and then; it is VERY high up there but with the sun terrace at least climbing out onto the roof isn't too much hassle for a person with a head for heights.

Ready to load the wood

My major task of the day (now Julian was moved and ready) was to shift all the beams and rough wood from the back bank round into storage so I put the boys in their enclosure and drove Thomas and the trailer up onto the top and reversed it into place really accurately. I was quite proud. It took me about half an hour to load both the trailer and the truck bed with the beams and where I had hoped I could do all of this in one trip it became clear that I would have to do another trailer load for the final big (HUGE) logs that I couldn't fit in this time.

Ralf as a passenger

With the load onboard, and Rambo safely round by the front door (probably bothering Orhan or Sally as they came down to get materials) I decided to put Ralf in the passenger footwell for the drive down to the green building and he seemed to love it. He sat there grinning and then, when I had parked, climbed across and out the driver's side door.

Here comes trouble

As I parked up Rambo finally woke from his slumbers (he hadn't been bothering anyone) and ran over to see what was going on. I was hot and thirsty from doing the loading so I headed inside to have a brew.

Barefoot fixing the guttering in place

I put the kettle on and popped onto the roof to find out what was going on and I found both Bekir and Sally barefoot on the boards working to hammer and secure the guttering into place. They must have found that being barefoot gave them better grip than their little rubber slipons.

I had my brew, chased up a few emails for paying work, and then went out and emptied the truck and trailer. At first I left Rambo and Ralf to walk around but while Rambo headed off after a while, Ralf kept getting in my way under my feet (quite awkward when you are carrying really heavy beams) so I put him in the enclosure, making sure to tell him he wasn't in trouble. Bless him he didn't fuss at all but just went and lay down in the shade and then, when I was done and he could come back out he just walked quietly over and joined me again. He was being super well behaved today.

Getting the straight edge to mark the nail points

Orhan pushes the next sheet across

And Bekir holds it for Sally to tack in place

I headed up to the roof again to see what was happening now and they had finished fixing the metalwork and were now hard at work (and I mean hard at it) putting the mokava into place. There are a couple of pictures for this as I was amazed and scared in equal parts at the dexterity with which they moved these large, unwieldy sheets around, particularly once they got to the second level where Bekir had to push them up with only a toe hold on the bottom to support him.

Cute Ralf wanting fussing

As I headed downstairs I found that Ralf had got bored waiting for me (I was up watching for quite a while) and fallen asleep, as he does, on the stairs. As I was snapping pictures he rolled over to have his tummy rubbed as he does and I had to show you just how cute he is when he does this. Bless.

Our large tortoise friend

It was then time for me to head back out (I made a brew but left it inside to motivate myself) and do the next load of wood. I walked Rambo and Ralf over to the enclosure and as we got close they both started barking and pointing as if I had an intruder. I walked round the corner so I could see if someone was there but couldn't see anything so, having picked Ralf up to ensure he went inside and didn't chase whatever it was, I popped him on the ground and he ran around, sniffing madly, then I noticed that he had found a large tortoise; the tortoise, in fact, which I'm sure was what Rambo was barking at the other night. I put them both away and legged it to get my camera.

Huge trunks being moved

Picture snapped I drove Thomas and trailer back up to the top and back the trailer into place. I then realised that I wanted to load the beams into the trailer, but the petchka wood into the truck bed so I unhitched and pulled the trailer round, and reversed Thomas right up to the pile of rubbish wood. It didn't take long to chuck it all into Thomas and then I pulled him round and rehitched the trailer before lifting the humongous logs that were left into the back. There were some super sized ones in this load however I managed to get all the petchka wood, and all the beams, loaded and driven down to the green building. It was lunch time by now, and the men were at their picnic, so I just pulled the truck up and parked it and carried Ralf (so he couldn't beg off the men, after leaving his breakfast) into the house for my own lunch.

Painting on the black stuff

It took me a while to cool down and want to eat but I did after a while and really enjoyed (you guessed it) cheese and tomato butties. The bread is so nice, as is the cheese and the home grown tomatoes, that I am no where near getting bored just yet. I was about to head back outside to do the unloading when I heard movement upstairs and thought I'd pop up to see what was going on. I was really glad that I did as the next step of the process was about to start. Sally had a bucket with the (really expensive) black tar like glue stuff over the top of the mokrava and Bekri and Orhan were getting a roll of the bitumen ready for application.

And getting the bitumen in place

The black stuff was really very sticky and I stayed to watch as all of it was painted on, and then Bekir and at first Sally, then Orhan, struggled to shift the long length of bitumen into place at the bottom of the eaves. It got stuck half way and was rucked up and I was starting to wonder how they would manage to get it smooth but I should not doubt these amazing workmen as a couple of flicks of the wrist and it was perfectly in place. Amazing skill.

Wood store getting full

So from there it was away from my vantage point as Orhan needed to lift the next roll of material into place so I went down and set to unloading the trailer. It didn't take all that long though it did take a lot of effort as these were some of the largest lengths I'd moved so far, but now my wood store is looking pretty good. There will be a load more to go in here when the final bit of the roof is removed, hopefully this week that starts.

Petchka wood in Thomas

I went and drank my brew down (in two swigs I was so thirsty) and relaxed for a bit, interacting with my paid work and getting some more work to do which was good, and then I headed back outside to do the last of the jobs for today; emptying out the huge amount of waste wood in the back of Thomas. It was such a large amount that I felt like I would never complete it but just plodding along, selecting easy to carry together bits and shifting them inside I was surprised how quickly the truck was emptied.

Petchka store

I now have quite a lot of wood in the garage which needs going through, having the nails taken out, and also getting trimmed to a uniform (ish) size for the petchka and/or fire. This is something which will be done over the next couple of months so we have enough wood here waiting to get us through the first few cold months next year. Hopefully next year won't be as miserable as this was and so we'll not need the petchka into June like this year.

Just waiting for the tiles now

The men were still working away, though they had to make their own coffee this afternoon as I was distracted with the tidying of the wood, and I popped up a couple of times more to see what was going on. They have left with probably over half of the waterproofing done so this should be completed tomorrow which will then leave the chance that the next section of old roof will come down.

The old roof and the new

During the afternoon I joined the men for a coffee break and Ralf came up with me. It was lovely to sit there, me mainly in silence obviously, and listen to the men chatting and watch them playing with Ralf who got each one to have a bit of a play fight before coming back to me, getting a fuss, and then moving on to the next person. The radio was on during this time and I was most amused to hear a turkish language cover of "Hotel California" being played. Brilliant.

It suddenly was time for the men to leave so I took the boys into their compound and then laughed as they once again found the tortoise which was nestled in the weeds by their enclosure. I left them pointing at it and watching it and went over to Bekir who laughed. I decided to water the chilis as they were looking a bit wilted and this started a mad rush of moving them as Bekir said it was no good where they were (too much exposure to the sun, I think) and they needed to be planted lower down where they'd be less blasted by sun and wind. Whoops. Anyway, I'll move the ones we didn't get round to in the morning. I went to lock up and found that Sally was about to wash his hands with petrol so I stopped him and found the swarfega for which he was very grateful indeed.

The journey back was fine apart from Lucy being so full of fuel that she scraped her arse up their cheren put really badly. This has made me decide that I am going to put half a tank in her from now on and see also if this has any impact on the fuel economy as she will always be lighter with a lesser fuel load. When I got home I was really hungry (as I've said) so I straight away started dicing a few potatoes and set about making a spanish omelette with a green salad side. It did not take long and it was so very tasty indeed. While I was eating Ralf started really bothering me, trying to climb onto my lap either from one side of my legs or the other, or by forcing himself between my knees. I kept pushing him away and telling him off and then thought maybe he wanted the toilet so took him outside but, other than the smallest wee in the world, nothing. Eventually, even after I'd eaten and I was trying to type this, he became so annoying that I picked him up and took him to the enclosure and put him away. I wonder if that was what he wanted all along.

A trail in the sky

Furnace

In detail

And there it goes... until tomorrow....

The sunset this evening was so gorgeous that I went up with the short lens and then got the long lens and took more pictures, hence you getting more than one shot of it.

Right, it is now late and I'm tired so I'm going to leave it there and head to bed. Night.