For you loyal readers I apologize for being approximately 6 months behind on the blog. In order to reward you for your patience, I’ll skip from Build Day 13 to Build Day 99 (August 2018) for a little taste of the progress we’ve made so far.
I was able to get an incredible deal from my job due to a temporary overmanning situation. Take 2 months off with half pay! Didn’t have to ask me twice. Buttercup and I arrived back on the Island in Mid June, and left 2 months later. The weather was much better than in Central Texas, I don’t think it ever got above 88 degrees on the Island, while back home it was over 100 on many days. Even with no air conditioning, we were sleeping with blankets every night. My lunchtime naps were also hard because with the great breeze we have I was actually too cold to sleep!
So here’s where we are at this point:
So Pretty!
Now it needs a deck!
And some stairs!
So a quick rundown of what we did over the 99 days so far. Finished the roof with internal gutters, stuccoed most of the walls with 3 left to go, and installed roll down hurricane shutters just in time for the bad part of Hurricane season. I’ll follow up with more detailed posts in chronological order as I strive to catch up. So don’t give up on us yet, I’ll catch up one of these days!
Meanwhile, big news! The “big house” next door has sat vacant for a couple of years due to a foreclosure. The location and the views are second to none (well, except maybe ours!). The house was a little neglected, and the interior was as they say on House Hunters International “dated” and needed some “updating”. Well the new owner decided to do it the easy way and do this:
Go Big or Go Home!
This is the result after a month’s worth of demolition by a 5 man crew. They filled up 6 semitruck sized dumpsters. We are excited by this, the contractor showed us the plans and it’s gonna be beautiful! We’re thankful that our new neighbors have the resources to take on this massive project, with other nearby rebuilding projects going on our end of the Island is looking great!
With the time pressure to get the house closed up before a Hurricane could take it, we didn’t do any of our usual kayaking/snorkeling trips. Our only break was the nightly tube float at the beach. An unexpected treat for a week or two was this:
The Artist and his minion!
We’re gonna need a bigger boat!
Somebody really likes sharks!
Just like the one in the water 10 yards away!
We were all a twitter on the golf cart ride down to the beach each day to see what new art was in the sand. We never planned ahead for pictures though, so all of these are from our friend Captain Jeff. Jeff lives on a very nice boat right in front of the bar he manages. He also has a great You Tube channel, here’s a sample https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSY8Ew0LnUc
Captain Jeff, one good looking salty dude!
There are some other characters who hang out at the beach, these are the ones you really gotta watch out for!
Party like it’s 1999!
Soon in the middle of August 2018 it was time to head home and get some farm work done before going back to my day job. As I got off the plane in San Antonio at 10 PM I just melted! It was 96 degrees at 10 PM. For a boy who grew up on the border 200 miles South of San Antonio I sure have lost my heat tolerance. As I write this a week later I’m still getting up the courage to get on the tractor and mow the field, it’s just WAY TOOOO HOT!
And I need a barber:
Not my usual military style haircut!
Two months and no haircut, longest it’s been in 35 years! One upside is that I kind of look like one of my personal heroes, Richard Feynman, the now deceased famous physicist:
He had the chops!
I can pull off the hair, but due to my being rhythmically challenged I don’t think the neighbors would like me taking up bongo playing. I do really want to play them all day though!