Telephones, Cameras and Computers

Let's see -- Wednesday just ended here in the central time zone and, though I only left home on Monday, I am feeling as if I am "missing out" on all of the excitement happening around the old farmhouse.  Joe is great about taking pictures ( no, REALLY!) and that, along with the phone conversations and email, helps keep me in the loop, but it isn't the same.

When we spoke yesterday, Joe reported the "good news" and the "bad news."  Now, when I'm there, participating in the adventure, the good and bad are rolled into one and they are just "the experience."  But for the experience to be recounted, it must be separated  into the "highlights" and the "end results."  So, yesterday's good news included the success in knocking down the old farmhouse's original chimney.

Original chimney, from inside the attic

Careful demolition -- bricks to be fed down
the remaining chimney, to contain the damage

Is this scary, or what???

The bad news included the loss of the lovely, 50 year old tongue and groove paneling that covered the wall that had been built to hide the chimney, when it was no longer used.  We'd hoped to retain that lovely paneling for use in the reconstruction, but is was not meant to be.

Beautiful paneling
ruined in demolition process

It seems, also, that our island stove, the beautiful deal we'd scored on Saturday, suffered damage when Joe had the two demolition kids help him move it from the van to the semi trailer for "safe keeping" until the old farmhouse is ready to receive it.  I suppose hiring strong demolition guys to move heavy, precious units, is a bad move...they are used to destroying, which, I might add, they do quite well!  Thankfully, when they "dropped" the unit, it was only the cabinet that took the damage.  We will have to sink more money into restoring the cabinet, but it IS salvageable.

We'll have to repair this end of the cabinet...

Meanwhile, typical "Green Acres" style, our "Mr. Haney" continues to deliver dirt to us, continues to try to sell us all kinds of weird odds and ends he thinks we might need for our projects, and performs minor electrical work for us.

More dirt, please, Mr. Haney!

He is a general contractor and does electricity, but I honestly wonder sometimes whether his is more Mr. Haney from Green Acres, or more Les Nessman from WKRP in Cincinnati!  Pictured here are his fingers, adorned with electric tape "bandaids" from where he cut himself during the job....

Les Nessman?

And... at the Pond house, the riding mower that stopped moving forward, backward or sideways was awaiting the examination by the lawn mower repair guy who sold Joe the box truck on Monday....part of that "deal" was for this guy to pick up the mower and fix it...  He was supposed to complete the pickup on Tuesday, but it ran into Wednesday before he made his way there.  The repair is determined to be a minor one, though not the belt replacement all had suspected.  Still, Joe showed him around the Pond house property and, like everyone else who sees it, the guy fell in love with the pond...another deal was struck and the guy will bring his son there to fish this weekend. (I suggested Joe should have required him to MOW THE LAWN in exchange for the fishing rights! LOL)

Fishing, anyone?

Of course, with my being gone, Joe is having to fend for himself for meals.  He's not a kitchen kinda guy, happy to exist on a loaf of good sourdough bread, and so, it came as no surprise when he admitted Tuesday, that he was eating for the first time that day, and that his "meal" consisted of a 50 cent fruit pie....this at about 7:00 PM.  Hmmmm.... Just as he was sitting down to chat with me on the phone and enjoy his "feast," he announced that a vehicle had pulled up in the drive.  So, exhausted as he was, he got up and went to investigate.   It turns out our neighbors recognized Joe would be in need of decent food, and brought him a care package...their leftover supper from the night before.  AND they invited him for Wednesday night supper!

Neighbor's Leftovers!

So, it goes...the guys finished up the clean up portion of the chimney demolition today, but I don't yet have photos of the "after."  Suffice to say, Joe, after enjoying a REALLY BIG supper with the neighbors, is catching up on some much needed sleep!  Still, the photos he sent last night show the progress.  Tomorrow will be a much lighter day, with only the deck guy, returning to build more walls and such in my eBay trailer, and to add a small landing and steps to access its back door.  Sure wish I were there in the "thick of things" but thank goodness for telephones, cameras and computers!

Removing old bricks for "reuse"