Heatwave Blues

28, 29, 30 July

A final flurry of activity in the month as the temperatures ramp up to 40 degrees.  Dave was up at 7am filling and firing up the mixer and then fixing another ladder frame for the edge of the door, while I used the mortar he made to set a base frame for the other side of the door.  The area round the door is one of those Gant charts where certain things have to be done in the right order before we can progress with putting bales around the SW window frame:

Both frames in, but we were left with nearly a full barrow of mix, so time to finish the long-delayed plastering inside the SE window.  First the last two panels over the scaffolding above the right side of the window ...

 

 ... then we moved the scaffolding round and finished the East wall panels (almost finished, cos the last bucket ran out before the bald patches were done, but it was 10.30 am and the sweat was running into my eyes so that I couldn't see to plaster any more and anyway, Dave wasn't willing to make mixes in 40-plus temperatures).  

All this activity took three days, starting early and finishing before 11 when we just wanted to sit in the cool of the music room with a fan and lots of water.  Somewhere among all this we finally managed to order the second load of bales - another 80, we reckon, to finish.  Due next week.  The Greek crisis has pushed the euro down, so our sterling buys more now than it has done in 10 years.

Continuing the mad dogs and English people theme, we went to the post office by bike at lunchtime on the 31st, and had to have several beers to recover once we got there.

Performances

Mid July

In between disappearing for weeks at a time, Dave has got together with a new band, called SoundWave, and is back playing lead guitar.  Some of the numbers are not quite rocky enough for him, but at least he gets out to gigs.  A little too much some weeks.  They've been playing a regular Monday night gig at a local hotel - nobody gets paid, but there are beers and experience to be gained.

 Here's the hotel, with two girls holidaying from Belarus who were dancing so exuberantly that my camera couldn't keep up!

Then on Thursday 23rd we held a small comedy and music show in the village up the hill, Palaiokatuna, and I was to perform in a short sketch and the final song - first public performance since the pretty dreadful Snow White in 2009.

 Waiting in the wings, ready to go on ...

 In action in the sketch, with Tree and Arran.

 The final song, having successfully managed my two lines in tune and loud enough - phew, the relief!  Tree, me, Jackie, Arran, Andy & Maggie.

 The next day, a rare visit to the beach to check out a bar that wanted live music ...

 ... and to attend a clarinet, guitar and voice recital by my singing teacher, Rosa and her visiting friend, Ed.

And a week later, the same venue, Dave playing a blistering Blues riff with the rest of SoundWave: John on drums, Panos on bass and Pete on rhythm guitar.

Doing a bit ...

July to 20th

Dave was away sailing for the first week of July, and due to go away again after a week's rest, so we didn't have high expectations for getting on with anything.  But then on Wednesday 8th, Dave said, 'I've got to get something done.' and leaped into action.  I thought I'd better help, so we put a coat of water-based varnish on the window box in the SouthWest diagonal.  A small job that we hadn't managed to get round to till now.

After that, we completed the final triangle of base frame up to the right-hand side of the front door (looking from the outside), which will support the ladder frame that runs up the edge of the door, and the bales in the wall behind it.  

 

Then Dave built the ladder upright to go at the south end of the diagonal, to hold the bales in place where they will eventually join with the cob south wall.

We constructed this frame out of the last long pieces of green-treated 5x7 (they were last because you had to be mad or desperate to try to build with them - Dave likened the frame to a DNA spiral, but forced it into shape).  Obviously, we needed more wood, so off to Lefkas to the woodyard, having checked they would take payment by credit card, since Greece was in the throes of the bailout crisis and no-one had any cash (including us).  And then it was the end of the week, and Dave was away again.

 

I didn't get very much done in my empty week, except that I wire brushed the front doorstep stones, and they came up very nicely.  I was going to grout them, but realised that this was our next centre of operations and there would be a lot of plaster and straw lashed around before long, so best to save the grout for after all that.

Dave barely gone for a day, and Oedi-puss settles down happily on his end of the sofa!