Beware of That Stafford House!
It Feeds on Your Money and Tears
Monday, May 29th, I managed to place approximately 25 blocks, in total, I currently have around 70 are in place. Unfortunately, I still have about one hundred 55lb. blocks left.
To view and download the photos, visit Google Photos.
As I completed more and more of this Great Wall, my perfectionist side of my personality became impossible to ignore. I usually only listen to it when I am at work and programming but it was overpowering and I caved.
I blame my dad (voice of common sense and logic). He said that no matter how much I want ‘Levelish*‘ to be acceptable, it wasn’t, level ≠ levelish*. That and another issue made it impossible to live with how the wall was, so I dismantled it Sunday, May 7th. Continue reading “The Great Wall of Stafford: Level ≠ Levelish. Must… Start… Over…”
Saturday, April 15th, 2017
The construction of the ‘Great Wall of Stafford’ has begun. Not only did I need to dig trenches that were 12″ deep and 24″ wide, I also needed to fix the grading in front of the new wall. Luckily, General Rental is just a mile away and they are very lax on renting large equipment out to people like me. I was surprised they let me rent the Mini Excavator, Kubota U17. They probably thought, “What’s the worst that could happen?”. Continue reading “The Great Wall of Stafford – The Beginning”
When Kathy and I moved into this house in June 2011, we had a lot of projects. She took on the ones that required tools and stuff I know nothing about and I chose to replace an old retaining wall with a less crappy wall. Since we couldn’t afford the fancy blocks, I settled for concrete blocks. I’ve hated that choice ever since and 2017 is the year I correct that mistake.
The New Great Wall of Stafford
I purchased 160 blocks totaling over 9,200lbs. I will need 40 more to finish phase 1 of the wall. Continue reading “It’s Starting this Spring… a Massive Retaining Wall”
Last year it was time to fix two other drooping areas with retaining walls. These two came out better than expected… and Kathy didn’t help me with the first row, I was actually calm… well except that time I lost it, threw a 20+lb block and felt like I tore off my shoulder… but it flew at least 5+ feet a distance to be proud of.
These two walls were really good practice… the behemoth wall of 2017 currently in prep is scheduled to begin Saturday April 15th. Continue reading “The Small Retaining Wall of 2016”