Week Eighteen

Week beginning 3rd October.

We have just arrived back from a long weekend in Edinburgh and are pleased to see that everything is where we left it. We were a bit worried when we left on Thursday night because gale force winds were forecast for Saturday but it looks like they might have passed us by. Phew!

On Thursday before we left, Des the plumber came and brought us a toilet and connected it to the waste pipe in the shed. Even though it is not a flushing toilet for us to use we can empty our toilet cassette from the caravan in it. This is a step forward for us and hopefully before too long we’ll be ready to have it fully plumbed in and a seat put on it so we can use it for it’s intended purpose.

We had a long weekend away so Pete could continue his involvement in the fantastic Portobello Book Festival. He’s been on the organising committee for a good few years now and loves it. The festival is ‘local but never parochial’ and organisers and authors do it for free, and best of all the tickets are free too.

We are expecting the scaffolders today but in the meantime we are going to get on with finishing sheeting the inside of the shed. Before we can do that we need to move the scaffolding tower from the house to the shed.

We have started dismantling the tower and Pete is up on the second level standing on the platform taking the cross bracings away. Suddenly the whole upper section wobbles and leans over and we are both shocked and scared.

We are taking a moment to work out what went wrong and how to remedy the situation so that we can continue dismantling the tower safely.

We have worked out how to do it and it’s easy and safe now. In no time we are reassembling the tower in the shed ready for the tasks ahead.

The forecast is for rain and true to form it arrives as we start work on the shed. We are measuring where to put batons between the trusses to nail on the OSB, rather than cut out the OSB around all the cross members which would take us ages and would be really frustrating.

It’s really unpleasant working with the rain coming in on us but we do have good waterproof gear from hill walking and we just have to get on with it anyway. The house and shed are like swimming pools and it’s a bit upsetting to see but then again we are not the first people in Scotland to have their half built house soaked by the rain.

Andrew sent an email to say the scaffolders apologise and say they will come next Wednesday. We are not too happy, but on second thoughts the forecast is for rain for the next two weeks so we wouldn’t be able to use the scaffolding to put the roof on anyway. So, if it’s not here we don’t have to pay for it when we can’t use it anyway.

We’ve finished working for the day and have changed into dry civvies to go and get our weeks shopping in Oban.

We are slow at getting up this morning because it’s still raining and we don’t fancy another soaking.

Our waterproofs are still damp from yesterday so we have decided that if the rain goes off we’ll put one of our huge tarpaulins up. The 8m x 5m tarpaulin should cover just over half the roof and give us some protection from the rain.

We are lucky, there’s a break in the weather so we dash outside to put up the tarp. We quickly work out how to do it safely and securely and before you know it we have a temporary roof covering.

With the tarp on we can steam ahead with sheeting up the rest of the shed and because we have the scaffolding tower we are much safer than if we had used the long ladders.

It’s dinner time and we have managed to get most of the OSB up and we are reasonably dry, in fact Pete’s waterproofs are dryer than they were this morning so the plan worked.

It’s another slowish start because the rain is still on. The forecast predicts gale force winds, starting around 2am tonight, so we will have to take the tarp down at the end of the day to avoid it acting as a sail and causing damage to the roof or causing chaos by blowing across the glen.

We are making headway but are having to stop because Andrew has arrived to see how we are getting on, give us a new task list and maybe install some windows.

As we are working our way round the site, adding tasks to our list, Molly’s cousin’s husband, Martin, arrives to see how we are getting on. He is offering us his help and is keen to get involved. This is brilliant and we are both delighted with Martin’s offer of help.

We’ve done what we can inside the shed with the scaffolding so we have moved it outside so that we can finish OSBing the gable and add some tie down straps to the roof ladders.

We have just set up the scaffolding at the south gable ready to finish the OSB and tie down straps in the morning. Our last job of the day is to tidy the shed and put away all the tools.

Between now and when we put on the roofs is going to be all about doing lots of wee but necessary jobs so there won’t be big noticable changes for a while. A bit boring but it’s all part of the process.