For those of you unable to attend

The 2019 fall Loon Weekend was a major success.  Lots of stuff happened.

Booboo brought Picasso Loon to his new home.

Dock Doc provided pasties (That's "past -- ease," Sinman)
prepared with new interesting novel ingredients:
marjoram and Guinness.

There were many other fine meals including Clam Chowder and Lasagna.  No one lost weight.

The DEC promised that the water would be let down the week before,
but the rain and slow hand on the valve
made it higher than it has been all year.

These two tried to convince us they were on the level.
You buyin' it?

Hard at work on the egress hole covers
by the masters of "design as you go."

Meanwhile, Booboo expertly drops a couple of trees,
sparing the small hemlock in the foreground.

An opaque egress cover for the guest house,
since the snake living in the hole really doesn't need much light.
Hopefully, it will provide crawl space access if necessary.

Covers in place.
Bring on the snow.

It's not just a downed tree.
It's a Pete filter.
After the tree disintegrated,
we invited him over for a beer.

Frosty Saturday morning.

Good thing Cut Boy is so tall.
He put up the gutters on the guest house almost single handed.
Would have gone faster if he'd used both hands.
He didn't need the ladder...that's for the shrimpy support staff.

Color match is superb.
One can barely see the gutter.
The overhang at the back is to assist in getting the water
away from the building
(and to remove the need for cutting metal).

Someone rewarding himself for all the hard work.

Last winter, the need to get into the crawl space
was caused by a snow drift covering the intake.
Reset was easy, once digging through 8 feet of snow and ice was finished.
The elevated intake and exhaust should prevent the need.

The pudgy purple hand
was caused by doing handstands to crush the wine grapes.
Or by poor handling of PVC primer.
Could be either.

Staining has begun.
Dr. John and Chowdahead begged to be allowed to do the deed
so that they could get high on the fumes.
Later that same night, they did a magic trick,
making a bottle of good scotch disappear.

Regretfully, there are no shots of the mud in the entryway or the sill on the window.  You'll have to see those for yourself.

Also missing - the ghost in the wood shot, images of the fine bonfire, OSHA ladder safety course images, and other stuff, no doubt.

And after all save one were gone,
the setting sun provided a spectacular sky.

Another Loon Weekend in the Book

Yes, another burst of activity in the woods.  Good stuff got done.

Here the door is being nailed in place, never to open again.

Shelves in a closet!
Short ones on Gimp 1's side.

Taller on the other side.
Her Majesty approved.

Though all were quite worried he'd shoot his eye out,
No mishaps were reported,
though hearing loss was suspected.

Almost all the snow was gone.
Lefty missed the cameraman.

The lake was high.

And someone finally got the hat he's always wanted.

The effort was wrapped up with a fine bonfire,
first of the season.
While the spirit is still willing, 
the body has other ideas.
The fire was out and all were in bed by midnight!

And there were fabulous prizes.

FABULOUS PRIZES !!!

October 2018 Loonatics at camp

If there is interior work to be done, it makes sense to make sure that prior to such work, the exterior keeps the elements outside.  Thus the leak detected in the spring and ignored all summer needed attention.

Vacuuming the pine needles out of the seams between metal roof segments.
Later, a few flicks with the screwdriver proved adequate.

A few long roofing screws and the impact driver did the rest.
Moisture is no longer expected to be forced beyond the seams by the wind.

Shortly after this photo was taken, Pete-from-next-door offered both a safety suggestion and the rope to carry it out.  A safety harness was formed by a loop around the waist.  Then the opposite end of the rope was thrown over the peak and secured to Peter's earth mover, insuring that a missed step did not result in a long fall off the slippery green metal.

Then all well-grounded folks came around to the business side, in anticipation of possible macabre entertainment that did not come to pass.

Later that Friday evening,
Booboo awards Chowdahead the hat
he's been wanting for so long.

Note the appropriate shirt.

Wind driven rain and sleet made the next day quite memorable,
but nearly impossible for outside work.

A little bonus hail on the deck.
The gang was all there,
 but not being paid enough to work outside in that stuff.

Nonetheless, a few logs were made ready for splitting.

In the garage, Cut Boy and Sam Adams made good progress
despite being harassed by Chowdahead.

Careful not to create relapse conditions necessitating additional back surgery,
Dock Doc excelled at supervision.

The Loonatics came to the unanimous conclusion that young blood is necessary.  Two heart issues, one recovering from back surgery, another with no prostate, and a fifth struggling with hearing problems and probably dementia.  When asked what his malady was, Chowdahead answered, "Baldness."

"But that's half the crew."

"Chronic flatulence?"

"That's at least the other half."

What's he pointing out?

Even inclement weather could not prevent proper grooming.

The little blue car snuggled up due to the weather.

A man perhaps overly happy with his work.
Were we wrong to give him the title of Hellfire?

The previous shot is uncomfortably reminiscent
of this Arnold Newman portrait of Alfried Krupp, don't you think?

Regardless, the work goes on!

Be sure that children can never access power tools.

Always observe proper safety procedures.

And be sure never to use a ladder on a stairway.

But it is just fine to use ladders to escape from mice.

Perseverance Pays!
Naughty pine is behaving!

Meanwhile, an experiment in acoustics is conducted.
As Thomas Edison once said, "Now I know what not to do!"

And in a final tribute to perseverance,
a couple face cords in place for the winter.
The birch is wet and the maple is punky,
so the average should be just right!

The last stick was stacked, and much of the crew on the road, so cleanup ensued.  Chowdahead pilots a mean vacuum.  Who knew?

A courtesy call on Pete at his house to thank him for the support and use of his machines was in order.  While informing him where the splitter rested under a tarp, Pete decided that he absolutely had to come over and grab some prints of drone shots of the lake.  

In he bustled with muddy boots, not only to grab the pictures, but to use the facilities as well.  Territory marked, he was soon headed back home.  Considering all the help he provided through the weekend, a heavy sigh was all that preceded the second cleanup.

The exit plans disrupted, the realization that a few things had been forgotten did not occur until near Utica.  The hope is that the Friday-night chowder will stay contained, even if it comes to life in the fridge.

Power to the People

Six years later, another weekend of Cinco De Mayo loonacy at the camp with the construction-minded Loonatics.

Yep.  Cinco de Mayo and still snow remaining in the massive pile
that gets created when the weight of the roof drift
overcomes the friction on the north side of the garage.

Don't ever stand here.

Look at all that debris emerging from the snow.  Forgot all about having to take care of that.  In honor of Cinco de Mayo, and the brave and outgunned Mexicans who repulsed the French, that will be dealt with...mañana.

Pretty much sums it up.

Each of the Loonatics has received a fabulous team logo hat, which also features his camp name, so that death and destruction do not result from ownership confusion.  To be completely truthful, each Loonatic except Chowdahead has received a hat.  He whines incessantly about not having one, even though he did not join the fowl band until after the most recent distribution.  Perhaps patience will be rewarded in the future.  But is waiting with whining really patience?

The two you see adjacent the sign are for Thing 1 and Thing 2.  These are provided to honorary loons during the time they are on-site.  

We often joke, "A bunch of amateurs with power tools and beer in the woods. What could possibly go wrong?"

Now we know.

Don't stand here either.
Windstorms like the one we endured Friday evening
have a habit of knocking trees down,
occasionally with ill effect.

This is not a backwoods religious symbol.
See the ceramic insulator on the left end of the yardarm?
See one on the right?
Gone with the wind.

The windstorm took down the lines and the power went out for the weekend. The damage was not limited to this one little pole. Since we're near the end of a dead end road with very few residents, the power company elected to go to other poles of priority long before patching our pickle.

Since we're not Amish, we rely on electricity to work. And most of us drink beer, but that's just an evil side effect of electricity, as the Amish will tell you. So off went the provisioning party to petition the purveyor of impermanent power. The ride out of the hills was rewarded with a brand new Champion Generator from Tractor Supply.

Just moved the snowshoes to the garage last week.
This generator was the preferred model because it came with a free t-shirt.
Upon seeing the shirt, Mary said, "Let me know when you're going to wear that thing
so I can be elsewhere."

A fine addition to the wardrobe,
which contains much worse.

Though we had to do a bit of juggling to run power to multiple buildings, we powered tools and the fridge, so all was well. Except the for the pump in the well, but who needs a shower, anyway?

Make one of these, and all of your troubles will be over,
especially if you put your fingers in the wrong place.

Remember to flip the main breaker to off so that the double-male contraption above can carry the power from the generator to the panel and the house without trying to power the grid.  Or have the generator all wired in and automatically substituting for the grid so that you hardly even know there is a power outage.  Hah!  Where's the adventure in that?

The answer is that the adventure is in your bank account.  There have been enough of those adventures lately.  So this expensive wired-in, auto-switching, auto-cycling (gotta run every so often, too) solution can wait.  At least 'til some figurative mañana.

Since any generator can only create a limited amount of power, numerous opportunities for creative solutions arise.  One such solution is shown below.

This ancient radial arm saw was placed on casters
so that it could be rolled closer to the generator.
At 2 extension cord distance, there was not enough current to start the saw.
A single cord away, the blade lazily ramped up to cutting speed
in a few seconds.

Yes, of course, we could have moved the generator, but that would have meant putting the fridge on the long cord run, or not powering it at all.  Remember the part about us not being Amish?

And yes, certainly we could have skillfully placed the beer in the remaining snow, but that would have meant walking ALL the way to the back of the garage when thirsty.

And yes, unquestionably, we could have dug snow out of the bank and filled coolers or other containers full of beer, but that sounds like work.

And yes, undoubtedly, we could have purchased ice on during a trip to civilization, but that melts all over the refrigerator and makes a mess (it did).  And there was food in the fridge as well, although a secondary concern.

Both hungry and not Amish.
Also quite brilliant when that headlamp is on.

What else could go wrong?

Really not what you want to see when you're many miles from a garage.
Yeah, the spare did not look much different.

Thankfully, the generator-compressor combination
made the this problem less of an issue.
And since there were other vehicles around,
sloth and lethargy allowed this fix to be done without the generator.

Since misfortune tends to happen in threes, the triad of calamity was completed by the last minute scratch of one of the members.  As a responsible owner of commercial property in far away New Hampsire, Mr. Bud Lightnin' had leased a meeting-place building to a Church Congregation.  The Pastor had prepared a powerful sermon which brought to life the travails of Noah, who with his family and non-human friends, braved the cleansing flood of the earth.

So powerful was this sermon that even before its intended Sunday delivery, a similar cleansing flood inundated the building (via a burst pipe). Our own diligent Bud Lightnin' subdued the longings of his heart and dutifully remained where the citizens live moisture-free or die, cleaning the building after the flood, just as Noah and his family must have done for the ark.

But even with all these tribulations, a good deal was accomplished.

Basement entry door upgraded to a steel exterior door.
Fie upon the rodents and drafts.

Lovely flashing has been applied to the underside of the deck
to divert water elsewhere.
Now the space can be used for storing fireplace wood,
or for spreading out a blanket and singing the Drifter's,
"Under the Board Deck."

"This knotty pine in the garage upstairs room looks really great," said the blind carpenter...

...as he picked up his hammer and saw.

Shortly before all arrived, a matching metal insert was fashioned
to provide a finished look over the fridge.

And the leftover material provided augmented tanning capabilities.

All in all, a confusing and tumultuous but productive weekend.  The power returned just after all the work was completed.  Later, the tale of the triumph of the Loonatics was related to Mary. 

"Oh sure.  You get a generator for your Loons, but not for me during all those times I've suffered through outages."

"All you had to do was pick up a saw!!!"