5.8

Sunday 26 January 2014

Rowan came and fitted the remaining windows during the last few days, so all we need is good weather.  We made an attempt on Sunday morning, opening the final package of scaffolding to extend the tower and fit the outriggers for extra stability. 

The extended scaffolding - but not yet at full potential height.  Dave is up there, but not chirpy enough to peer out and wave!  We managed one mix, before the rain started again and we retired to our sofa.

In the event, this was a good thing.  Around mid-afternoon we had the biggest quake we've felt here for a long time.  It was registered as a 5.8, epicentred close to Argostoli on Cephalonia and it went on for what seemed like ages.  Mostly a quake is just a few seconds, but this one went on and on.  (Apparently only 45 seconds, but long enough).

We stayed put in our attic, listening to the house frame creaking, but not feeling particularly threatened.  That close to the roof, there's not much that can fall on you (unless the floor goes ...)  Anyway, all we heard were creaks, but after it was over we put on raincoats and checked all our work.  Wonderful!  There were no cracks in either the stem wall or the plaster, it had all coped very well.  Okay, a 5.8 isn't that big, but it was still the first seismic test the house has been put through.

There was a second strong aftershock later that evening, it registered 5.2 and came while we were watching a superhero movie.  As our sofa quivered in time to the action sequence we were very impressed with how realistic Hollywood special effects are nowadays.

Still plastering

Monday 20 January 2014

Jonathan's birthday, and we're still plastering, Dave still suffering, with the virus gone to his belly.  At most we're getting two mixes on the wall, but more usually only one.  Dave tiring easily, and without the window frames there are only patches that we can do.  We fitted another rafter board to the east wall, mirroring the one on the west wall, and plastered up to that.  Rowan brought a drip-lip for the top of the door frame, so that could be finished, and the little pantry window. 

So by the 20th, we still had this section - the highest wall, the north-east end backing onto the kitchen below and the studio above - to finish. 

 Rowan came round with the last two frames, but they needed more primer, and he didn't have time to fit them just then, but at least we know they are here.

And the land just keeps on throwing up iris, these are in a big clump down near our old potato patch.

 

Snare Scare

15 January 2014

When we got up this morning, the big white cat, Schrodinger, was acting strangely, he was wet, with his fur plastered down as if he'd been out all night, and Dave spotted a wire sticking out from his waist.  We worked out he'd got himself caught in a wire snare, been trapped all night and freed in the morning by whoever set the snare cutting the wire.  Not good for poor Schrodie.  He was frantic.  But he did come to me, anxiously, sidling and fretful.  Well, we did the obvious, Dave got the wire cutters and I held onto the cat.  But we didn't allow for how distressed he was. At the first touch he yowled and scratched and clawed, drawing blood on Dave.  I didn't hold him, and he shot out into the rain. 

We spent the day anxious and feeling we'd betrayed him, unable to settle down, we kept putting on oilskins and searching the land, going further afield each time we ventured out into the drizzle between cloudbursts.

By dusk, we'd given up any expectation of finding him, but emerging from our bedsit, I found him back on his cushion, obviously in distress and unable to settle comfortably.  The wire was still round him.  During the day we had analysed our mistakes, and had a plan ready.  I coaxed him to have some food, just to settle him down and make him trust me.  I was able to pick him up under his shoulders, and by now he was getting exhausted. 

We laid him down on towels on a straw bale, both in big gloves, I took hold of as much scruff as I could grasp, wrapped his head and foreclaws in towels and laid on him.  Dave got a finger under the wire, avoiding the scrabbling back claws, and snipped.  Phew.  Schrodie limped off into the night, grudgingly grateful, probably to empty his poor strangled bowels.

 The removed snare -with coins for sizing - very tight for a big cat's waist

a few days later, back being a happy cat, no apparent ill-effects

Birthday

16 January 2014

It doesn't seem likely, but Mad Robbie has reached his 60th birthday.  So a celebration was held.  In George's.  Dave and the band were playing, but first there was a small stage play, in which Robbie was (all unprepared) arrested on his boat for Crimes Against Comedy, and brought to trial in George's.  I appeared as a witness for the prosecution on the charge of Character Assassination.  We all wrote our own statements and it went off very well.  Video footage was taken, but I haven't seen it yet.  Unfortunately my camera was tucked away safely in the band gear, so I don't have photos of me in costume as Miss Jean Broody - perhaps just as well!

Lots of fun was had, and the band played a storm.  Dave's virus keeps hanging on, so he was under the weather, which was a pity for him, but we stayed out till 2am, so he did all right.

Spring weather

Monday 13 January 2014

At last, a few days of sunshine.  We got more plastering done, on the east wall, around the window frame and into the door, where it seems my experimental 'long-straw' process is working.  The second coat seems very robust.  And while we've been distracted by all this work, it seems a load of iris have sprung up all around us.

Window detail

Saturday 11 January 2014

Time to plaster up to the new window frames.  Rowan had brought the frame for the west window by now as well, so we did the final detailing before plaster on both windows.

The frame is fitted into the window box with a small plywood extension over the wall, so that membrane can be stapled behind it.  The top of the window frame has a 'drip-lip' a small shelf with a groove running underneath it to encourage water to fall off, rather than run back into the window.

 A bead of sealant is run all round the edge of the frame, on the ply.

Then a second layer of membrane is attached, over the ply.

 And finally, a layer of plastering mesh is fixed over the top of the membrane to assist plaster adhesion.  This is all very over-the-top, but if it keeps water out of the corners, it will be very worthwhile.

And the west wall is finished, all first-coat plastered around the window frame.  The frame has yet to have opening casement pieces fitted, but Rowan has prioritised the outer frames for us to help get the plastering done as soon as possible.  Unfortunately, Rowan is already committed to two other jobs, so he's doing our frames in the evening and when he's rained off other jobs.

West bale wall

Friday 10 January 2014

With the north wall covered in the first coat of plaster, we moved on to the west wall.  Still waiting for the window frame, but the rafter board was fitted and painted. 

 The scaffolding had to go up a section to get right into the top, but it did the job very well.

Black hawk unknown

Driving down our track Dave stopped the car and pointed this out.  I took a long-range photo, which my camera isn't good enough for, so we only have this silhouette.  Not sure what it is.

First Frame Fitted

Tuesday 7 January 2014

After the tree-trimming, Dave moved on to hacking away a rogue bit of re-bar that has annoyed me for a long time, especially when building this section of the wall.  Phew - glad that's gone.

 Then we cut and fitted this adjustment to our window boxes.  We had thought it would be a good idea to put top and bottom protrusions on the boxes, to make it easier to fit a top drip-lip and a window sill, but Rowan felt this would create water penetration points.  Apparently most damage to straw bale houses is around windows, so we're being obsessive about trying to get this right.  First step - trim some of the lower edge, and exend the sides.  Then paint wood preservative.

 Meanwhile, we also cut and treated this long board to box in the area between the bales and the rafter on the west wall.

 This is the relevant space - the bales are of varying dimensions and don't all touch the rafter.  We will gouge out a channel in the straw and jam the board into the bales before screwing it to the rafter.  Dave can then plaster up to the boxed rafter for a good finish.  The lime-heavy plaster will discourage insect intrusion if we get a good seal.

Next stage for the window fitting - Rowan arrived and after attaching waterproof breathable membrane to the back of the frame - there is a little plywood surround to facilitate stapling - he levelled, glued and screwed in the first window frame. 

It's an amazing colour combination, isn't it?  Orange frame and pink membrane.  Especially with the blue mesh and yellow spirit level.  Perhaps we should keep this in mind for the top coats?

Obscuring the sun

Tuesday 7 January 2014

We seem to be making very little hot water.  Even on a sunny day, the water only gets lukewarm.  So I sneaked away from the plastering long enough to check out the water heater, and found that the cute little cypress trees that were about the height of the camper van when we moved in, have grown a bit.

The sun comes round to the south and gets stuck behind the newly-tall tree in front of the studio hut, below, stays behind trees all the way round to mid afternoon, and then remains obscured by the camper-van trees shown above.  Very little light is falling on our water panel (end of the shed, above)

So we got all radical and Dave trimmed them back.  Most of these are self-seeded, and will need to be kept under control if we're not going to live in a pine forest.  It does seem a pity, but we selected the site for its openness to the south.  And warm water is lovely!

Cat Wars

January 2014

Our cosy stack of still-unused bales is proving attractive to the local stray cats.  A couple of adolescent kittens have taken up residence in one of the nooks between bales.  This is a problem because we have to supervise our cats at feeding time, or the little male drives them away.  After a while the little female disappeared, possibly starved out by the male.  The male has also taken to spraying his territory - our kitchen.  Eugh. 

I came down one morning after hearing clattering, and found the little male (informally known as 'Squirt') with his head stuck in an empty cat food tin from the bin.  Very funny, but I just failed to catch him.  He's very quick. 

 

Skits is unamused

Frustrating weather

Sunday 5 January 2014

We are working perhaps one day to every two when the weather makes it impossible to use the mixer or keep plaster from getting too sodden in the barrow.  The tarps are difficult to work round, we try to keep them partially hung so they can be reattached quickly when storm clouds gather. 

On rainy days we mope around reading, painting (me), playing music (Dave), or, in this case, setting up a guitar hospital on the workbench:

Sunday was a better day, so Dave managed to complete the plastering over the boards on the north wall, but having developed a virus, took himself off to rest with half a barrow of plaster left to be used up. 

So I had a go.  There weren't many ground level areas left untouched except this spot between the big kitchen and little pantry windows, and we are staying clear of the immediate window surrounds for when the frames are fitted.  Still, I put a bit on - it's more difficult than I expected, as the plaster has to be pushed hard into the straw to form a good bond.

I also developed a technique for the edge of the music room external door - it is only 5cm of wall, as the window box comes tight up against the door frame.  I stuffed a mix known as 'long-straw' - a light coating of plaster on a handful of straw shoved hard into the gaps in the ladder frame with plasterer's mesh stapled over each handful working up the wall.  This is very tough on the stapler which inevitably got coated in lime. (Sorry Jonathan, I used the new stapler you gave us, it looks worse than the old one now!)  Then a light coating of plaster over the mesh once everything is in place.  This effectively disguises the ladder frame and softens the frame to match the bales on the opposite side.

With a little bit of plaster still left, I decided to experiment on an interior wall, using an obscure corner of the studio as a test site.  The problem for interior plastering (when we eventually get a chance to get round to it) is that the bales are hard up against the wood frame, but the frame is 12cm deep.  We don't want 10-11cm of solid plaster in the gaps (expensive, labour-intensive and would take years to dry), and we don't want 6-8cm ledges all round, gathering dust.  I tried taking flakes from a left-over part-bale and tying them to the bale strings behind.  This sort of worked, but the bale flakes are quite spongy to touch, so it will depend how tough the plaster gets whether they would be vulnerable to cracking if knocked.  It also took a long time, so it may not be a practical solution.  More thought needed.

Waiting for windows

1 -3 January 2014

Dave made a fabulous effort on New Year's Day and rustled up a posh breakfast served with a slice of our one-and-only home-grown lemon!

Then on Friday, Rowan appeared with the first window frame - we had decided to test-pilot the east window in the music room first, which was not a very clever idea (of mine!) as it is perhaps the most demanding one being situated right next to the external door.

A slight improvement in the weather had sent us out to the mortar mixer again, and most of the music room north wall was now coated.  We spent Friday cutting and fitting wooden boards, shown below, into the rafters to make a strong connection between the plaster and the roof.  The boards are orange because Rowan warned us about the many European Wood Boring Beetles that inhabit Greece - his family had found beams turned to dust in only 10 years.  We went for super-strength termite spray followed up by the orange paint - which is actually red lead, used by the fishermen to prime their wooden boats - not nice stuff, but potentially more environmentally friendly than rebuilding the house every 10 years.