Just another, log in the wall

We managed to finish the cordwood walls. With the colder temperatures the curing is going very slowly so I'm just going to hope it doesn't cause problems down the river. The photos don't really show the progress though. Maybe when I take down the frame and tarp to put the roof on. That should be my next visit if it isn't raining. Roof, windows and hang the door.

Once it's all closed in I'll be able to sleep there and hopefully by Christmas I'll have everything finished so we can spend some nice winter nights there. All that will be left is the floor, insulate the ceiling and install the wood stove. The woodstove might be a bit tricky as when we had it going to warm up the worksite it was very smoky, the stove didn't draw well. It seems to produce a lot of soot and the chimney cap as very clogged. I've cleaned it but I'd rather not have to do that every time we go up.

Here is one photo that might give you an impression about what it looks like now:

Ill fares the land

Tony Judt was a bonafide intellectual, an author a university professor from a big time school, a first class international education. So as read another of his books, Ill fares the land I find it interesting that while he identifies the same problems and causes in the world today that I do, he views the solution as almost the opposite of me.

Like many others, the late Mr. Judt was enamoured with Social Democracy in particular with that form practiced in Scandinavia. And it's easy to see why, the Scandinavian countries rank high in all the positive categories when ranking countries. However, on the very first page of this book he states the reason why I do not think this is a realistic option in North America; "For thirty years we have made a virtue out of the pursuit of material self-interest: indeed, this very pursuit now constitutes whatever remains of our sense of collective purpose." North Americans are a not a society linked by common history, religion or even language like the overwhelming majority of inhabitants in the Scandinavian countries.

With the exception of a few (and largely very poor - coincidence?) groups, North Americans are linked by one common trait - we or our relatively recent ancestors came to this land to get rich or die tryin'. We are not really a “we” in any sense beyond this one sorry excuse for commonality. If all you have to hold your society together is the pursuit of material self-interest how do you reconcile that with high taxes to benefit of strangers?

The “occupy” series of protests even reflects this. The protestors have one common fiscal complaint but that seems to be all there is to it. There seems to be some vague notion that the governments of the world should do something about people accumulating too much wealth. What exactly is too much wealth and what should be done are hardly agreed upon facts? Don’t get me wrong, I do agree that the wealth disparity in the world is atrocious.

Here’s what I’d like to see as a start: I’d like to see the government butt out of big business. The idea that wealthy people need tax breaks to encourage them to become “job creators” is stupid. If someone is so wealthy that a hihgh tax rate makes it not worth it for them to create more personal wealth then that’s just fine. Someone else will provide the services/production that isn’t worth their effort. Even if this other person does it less efficiently it will spread the wealth around and that is good for society. The idea that companies owned by multi-millionaires should get R&D grants from tax dollars is stupid. And companies, all companies should be allowed to fail. Unions should be allowed to negotiate/strike their members out of a job by killing the company. If the role of any company is so important that it cannot be allowed fail then that role should be a function of government and not the private sector.

Yes, I’m aware that there would be a period of economic contraction but I honestly think that would be a good thing for the 99%.

Oh, and for the working class I’d like to see a change in EI benefits to allow an unemployed person to take their benefits in a lump sum as a grant to start a small business. I’d like to see more self employed people making a decent living for themselves from a small business and I’d like to see fewer “wage slaves” making millions for corporate fat cats filling the same roles.

So why won’t I ever see this? It is the nature of government to control, sometimes called govern, and in a country of millions of people it’s easier to deal with a few mega corporations than thousands of small producers. But when the mega corporations become too big to fail in the eyes of the government who is really in charge?

A little more each time

We were back up for a couple of more days between the rain and we managed to finish off two more walls. It’s starting to look pretty closed in so I’m fairly confident now that we’ll have the bunkie finished for this winter.

This is the corner we finished, the two dark spots are Lug tread bottles we have stuck in the wall for fun. We don’t plan on doing that to the house but the bunkie is a fun little building.

From this next angle you get the idea that it’s closing in pretty well. Next time we head up we’ll either work on those last two wall panels in the weather is good or we’ll put in the windows and door and put on the roof. I figure that with three sides and a roof done and the frame to tarp in the fourth side a little fire in the wood stove should allow us to lay up mortar even when it gets colder.

Speaking of getting colder I winterized the bee hives. Last week Grandmaster J helped me put the hive boxes in a tighter area and this week I wrapped them in builder’s paper, insulted the roofs and put up a wall of hay bales to help block the cold wind that blows in from Stoco Lake.

Here’s an awesome shot of the Ranger looking very much like a farm truck. (note the awesome bead seat covers!)

And the winterized hives.

I will probably put up some other wind barrier on the back side before winter but right now I want to be able to access to the feeders so that on warm days they can come out and get some sugar syrup rather than eating their winter’s store of honey.

Occupy Airports

A lot of people seem to be selfish, short sighted and stupid. I am thinking about the terrifying popularity of the Government of Canada's announcement that they will not allow Air Canada's flight attendants to exercise their right to collective bargaining by removing their leverage. Apparently flight attendants are an essential cog in our society. Despite the existence of competing airlines not going on strike. Really? Flight attendants are such essential workers that not even a portion of them can stop working? I wonder if this will still apply when the next round of layoffs are coming? And let's face it, air travel is an industry in contraction so layoffs are coming. But I digress. What I meant to be talking about is the future of working Canadians not the walking corpse that is Air Canada.

I don't see the recent position on the flight attendants as an isolated incident. I tie it together with the back to work legislation pushed on the Postal workers. Legislation that punished working class Canadians by imposing a lower wage than that offered by their employer.

A lot of people would say these jobs don't require a lot of education or skill and so the people doing these jobs are overpaid already. I see this as a dangerous game to get into. Who is to say you aren't overpaid too? Your rare skills are your job security? Well I was recently listening to a radio show on robotics that I thought was very interesting. The essential point I took from the show was that it's no coincidence that every job that is currently being done by computers or robots was once a job believed to be too complex for a machine to do.

It's basically a story of economics. It's only worth it to R&D machines to replace highly paid humans. Why make a really good sanitation robot when you can hire a human to do the same work for peanuts? But replacing a highly paid surgeon with a tireless robot who can do more surgeries, that's worth the price of admission. That's why right now, somewhere, someone is making progress on that very robot. And healthcare wait times means they probably have government funding.

So I guess there is a silver lining for the posties and flight attendants, if their pay gets low enough it'll be that much longer before automation has them looking for new careers.

Construction proceeds

We had some help in the forms of beautiful weather, Grandmaster J. and Sir C. Thanks guys! this Thanksgiving weekend and I’m now feeling pretty good that the bunkie might get done before winter.

This is where we are now:

My hope is to finish the wall with the door in it and maybe the back wall. If I can get that done I can put a tarp on the frame by the just started wall and light the wood stove and extend the building season.

The bad news is one of my window boxes went out of square while we were building so it’s going to be tough to get that window in. i’m going to have the brace the remaining window boxes better.

This is the offending box (and a close up look at what the walls look like) :

And I forgot to post a picture of Shed Bee:

Pretty good eh, almost looks store bought!

Will Feral Cat

Some of you may have heard tales of the elusive Will Feral Cat. At long last your correspondent has obtained photographic evidence of his existence. And here it is:

I’m assuming Will is feral because he has no tag and is very skittish, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to him.

We’ve also started work on the cordwood bunkie / practice building. We are trying out three different mortar mixes and are now thinking to do a test patch of poplar wood. The experts say it’s good for cordwood building but the wood itself is rather unimpressive to us.

Here’s a shot of the worksite:

And another from later on in the process:

It has become a race against the frost as most of the week we had taken off work to work on the bunkie was raining. the humidity of many days of rain made it impossible to do mortar work even though the worksite is covered. Stay tuned.

It’s a lot more fun than even the best office job. Even with the chill and the damp.

That said, this is this year’s squash harvest:

So I won’t be quitting that office job just yet.