Lumberyard inspiration

I can vividly recall, back when we lived in the USA, sorting and sighting (for straightness) dozens and dozens of the cheapest 2x4s at Lowe’s or Home Depot for various projects. Whatever words I might attach to that experience, “inspiring” would probably not be one of them.1

Going to the local lumberyard here is entirely different.

Whole cut logs at lumber yard, Uruguay

How can you look at entire logs sliced raw into thick slabs without starting to imagine things to make out of them?

Boards "au naturel" at our local aserradero, Uruguay

Inside, you can wander around among the various wood products, including dimensional lumber, either comun (I think they use that term) or cepillado, planed. But then these gems of individuality.

cheao interior door, Uruguay

But I wasn’t there for inspiration, but rather 3mm plywood veneer to re-face an abused and incredibly cheap bathroom door, since we have friends arriving in a week who will stay in the casita. It’s not a standard size, so I couldn’t simply buy a new one. Note that it doesn’t have a frame — just little pieces of wood glued to the veneer. I think they’re a little more solid up north.

trying to re-face interior door
So, glued, clamped, and ya veremos (we’ll see)!


1 However, being in North America, at least I didn’t have to double-check them for accurate dimensions and right angles

Aguas Dulces after the storm

We had quite a storm here at the end of last month.

We returned today from Aguas Dulces. I normally don’t like to post lots of photos, but I think in this case they will help you appreciate its aftermath.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
From our friends’ deck. The lower right was their front yard.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Neighbor on the left: front third of house gone.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Neighbor on the right: no house anymore.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Gone.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Gone.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Gone.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Gone.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Gone.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Meet your new front yard.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
People scurrying in and out — salvaging furniture?

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Meet your new front yard.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Meet your new front yard.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Gone.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Meet your new front yard.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Meet your new front yard. Feel lucky.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016

No doubt a lot of people feeling this way. But dunes are built by wind and waves, moved and removed by winds and waves, and wind and waves have little regard for your desire to live with a view of wind and waves.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016

Meanwhile, the local “council” has suspended rubble cleanup after a court order. Seems they felt they could take into their own hands the destruction and removal of private buildings (on public land — ah, complicated).

The last big storm was 31 December, 1988. Expected storm surge is up to three meters. In this storm it was five meters above normal sea level.


Design Notebook

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016

On a lighter note, some imaginative decorations of other buildings in Aquas Dulces.

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016

Aguas Dulces, Uruguay, November 2016
The door on the right says NO ESTACIONAR — NO PARKING 😉

2016-11-19

1119-01
A horse skull in the “woods”
1119-02
Dogs at peace, for now
1119-03
Dove, tree
1119-04
Aloe vera, morning glory
1119-05
The Bandido
1119-06
Lots of sand between the toes after wandering with Ralf and dogs
1119-07
What next to expect?
1119-08
Our backyard pine, looking kind of old-south USA
1119-09
and the freaky sky.

The lizard, bees

Here’s Ralf’s photo of the “dinosaur” Benji found the other day.

Monitor (?) lizard, Uruguay

While Syd knows the entire area like the back of his hand, and has a pretty set route, Ralf likes to wander and explore. The other day we ran across beehives, which I’ve seen before, but wouldn’t be able to find on a map.

Happy honey bees in Uruguay, 2016

How nice to know that honey bees are happy and thriving in Uruguay!

The usual garden story

A few days ago, I transplanted three squash seedlings. They’re doing fine, but …

Volunteer squash

… I now see six. Hmmm. And when I check on the first of the tomatoes I transplanted,

Volunteer squash

I see six more. On the second transplanted tomato,

Volunteer squash

SEVEN squash plants! I had given each transplant a healthy amount of the compost I had taken out of our bin just prior, which a few days later

Volunteer squash

looks like this. Maybe I can get some of these starts to grow at our chacra, where we have plenty of room for sprawling squash vines.

So this is how my garden grows!

Volunteer cilantro

The tomato seedlings are in a bed with a fair amount of cilantro, which I also didn’t plant this year.

And yes, I do need to do some weeding.

Greetings from ANTEL

In January, it will be ten years since I last lived in the United States, and one wonderful and immediate change was no more junk mail! Now all our utility bills are delivered electronically, which is great. There’s almost never anything in the outside mailbox.

ANTEL (Uruguay) sends bill ten times

But, yet to find and explanation: why they emailed yesterday’s bill ten times.

Well, some credit due — at least you don’t have to type “www” to get to their web page on this just-recently-introduced Internet thing.

The pool on the beach

Though I’ve always considered myself a mountain person, I do enjoy the constant changes of the beach. Today the small waves were washing up and over, forming and immense pool that ran the length of the beach.

Flooded beach, Atlántida, Uruguay
Though the camera I bought four years ago can take a panoramic shot, I had no idea how to do that, so sloppily put two images together manually instead.

This is looking back from the direction I came. We crossed this about as far as you can see, where it was ankle deep. As I watched the dog struggling more and more to get his stick, I knew that was changing. Crossing back, the water came up to my thighs! Fortunately warm 😉

The real election question

Yes, I’m an American. No, I didn’t vote in 2016. Or 2012. Or 2008. I honestly don’t remember about 2004, the year both major candidates were related, and belonged the small and secretive Skull and Bones cult at Yale. That might be when I decided to call it quits. Also, there was the “convenient” discrediting of paper ballets in the 2000 election, which allowed easily-rigged electronic voting machines to take over.

After 9-11 (which my wife called as an inside job before the second WTC building [of several, not just two] disappeared, causing our  part-time-police cleaning lady to walk out of our house, never to return), I began looking to alternative sources of information. Some sites were misleading, some bogus, some with unstated agendas, but a picture began to emerge: the official story was obviously a lie,1 and the mainstream media, 90% of which is owned by six corporations,2  was spouting that lie. Over and over.

So as the world reeled in shock yesterday at the US election results, I was shocked, too, to realize how many people still consider mainstream media a reliable source of information.

They reeled in shock because ‘everyone knew’ that the candidate whose supporters filled stadiums, sometimes several in one day, didn’t have a chance against the candidate that couldn’t fill a high school gym. And how, pray tell, did ‘everyone know’ that? Glad you asked:

Huffington Post propaganda

New York Times hoax election poll

Washington Post propaganda

(24 October 2016)


So the real election question: will you continue to regard these people as ‘experts who somehow got it wrong’ and accept their crocodile tear ‘apologies’ as genuine, or will you begin to see them for what they are, people paid to lie to you?

This is not a political question. It is more important than that.


1 the truth remains elusive, but an evidence (not hypothesis) based investigation yields fascinating results
2 based on comments from people from and in various countries, this lack of media diversity is not just in the US

Trump districts
Oh sorry, we’ll do better next time, honest – NYT

election fraud cartoon