Today in the news

Well....Been a busy couple of weeks round these parts, in a good kinda way.

First, progress on Casa Juvat.  The septic is installed, inspected and buried. 

Lots of cool tools on Rancho Juvat lately.  No, Beans, they wouldn't let me try it out.  Dang it!

All done

The fire place is finished.

We think we're going to stain the mantel just a bit darker for a little more contrast.

The tile work is all but done.  I say "all but" because the construction supervisor, on consulting with his supervisor offered us a different option.

They offered to replace the tile in the bottom of the opening (lower right corner of the pic) with a piece of matching granite as a ledge.  They're thought was that it would stick out about an inch to the bathroom side of the wall and make prettying up the drywall/tile seam much easier.

We said ok.

The appliances were delivered last week.  That's been the one "oops" the construction supervisor has made.  Electricity was supposed to be hooked up week before last, but the electricians were delayed.  Got to have plumbing and electricity before appliances, so they can test them after installation. So, they went back to the store.

Ahh well.  He's human, he's authorized to make a mistake once in a while.

All that having been said, we did get some good news.  I had called our sales rep to ask her to walk me through the "end game" once construction was completed and we got ready to close. Basically, what documents were needed, who was providing them etc.  Based on the items discussed, I called various agencies that would need to be involved.  In other words, I called the road guy, the bank and the survey company.

Surprisingly, the survey  company said they weren't very busy and a couple of days notice would be all they needed.  Good news for us, bad news for them I expect.


The road guy didn't need much lead time either.  While the final surfacing of the road and low water crossings will wait until construction on the house is complete, the builder in the final inspection needs to prove to the inspector that a vehicle can drive into the garage.  Road base was delivered Saturday for the road guy to make that so.  So, more progress.

The bank however said that closing could take between 60 and 90 days to process paperwork.  We can't move in until closing is complete, so...Mrs J has been very industrious in putting together paperwork.

Who knew the essay I wrote for Sister Mary Elephant in 4th grade would be needed to close a bank loan in 2020?

But...I spoke to the construction supervisor about how far out he thought we were in completing construction.

While I've been saying Christmas (and am still keeping that as my date), it looks like that it might be Suz for the win! (A few weeks back, she had prognosticated a Labor Day date.)

The supervisor couldn't guarantee a date, but unless something catastrophic happens, construction should be completed by the end of August.  With Mrs J's industriousness, we've got the major paperwork submitted, so the bank's processing timer has started ticking.

In addition to paperwork, Mrs J found a design program on-line that allows you to input a rooms dimensions as well as proposed furniture dimensions and play around with the placing and fit. So, we've taken a few things up there to see how they look.

She liked the rug, and something other that wet tile when stepping out of the shower is wise.

She wanted a couple of candle holders and some greenery to give the fireplace depth and color.  Unfortunately the candle holders arrived with broken glass so are being returned. 

So...the Casa Juvat project is progressing well, however knowing my luck with paperwork, I'm still holding out my Christmas date.


On the other side of keeping busy, last month when we were in "Detroit on the Bayou", helping MBD and SIL move in to their new digs, She had asked me if I'd make them a desk.  He for his studies, she for working from home.  I said ok.


So, I've been working on that for a couple of weeks now.  (Mornings only, woodshop gets too warm by lunch.  Sweat in the eyes isn't really conducive to keeping fingers intact.

I thought the glue up went pretty well.  The cedar planks came just under 3/4" thick and after planing were just slightly bigger than a 1/2", so I laminated a sheet of 1/2" plywood to the underside to keep them straight and give them added strength.  Trim the edges with Cedar and a couple three coats of Polyurethane and it'll look pretty nice.  

So, as I say, busy, busy.

But...Wait....More good (ish) news.

Little J got an "on or about" date for release from Durance Vile.  Unfortunately, that date is also "the end of August".  But, and it's a big one, they're at least talking about getting him out of there.  So...That is pretty darn good news.

Unfortunately, whenever he does arrive back in Kuwait, there's that wonderful 14 day quarantine before he can rejoin DIL.

What a world we live in.  Speaking of which...

I didn't get a chance to watch the President's Independence Day speech, but I did read the speech here.  If you've only read the press reports on the speech as I had, you need to read it.  I think it's an excellent speech, brought a tear or two to my eyes.

No, I didn't see anything in it that would justify the NYT and WaPo reports.  It's as if they really want to instill conflict and division in America.  That's not something an American would want.  Therefore.....

Not wanting to leave on that note,  I thought I'd provide a little enlightenment of what my life was like "back in the day".  (When I had hair and was a tad, ok quite a lot,  thinner.)  To that end, I found two pretty good fighter aviation videos that I hadn't seen before.  The first purports to be "F-15 vs F-16" dogfights at Red Flag.  It's not exactly that, although there are some shots from a cockpit mounted camera taking pictures of the pilot during some dogfights.  And there is some spectacular footage of low level flying.  So, on a scale of 1-10, I'd give it an 8.  I felt my stomach muscles contracting in turns and only said "Oh, BS!" once.

The second one was also interesting.  The narrator is a retired Colonel with about 3400 hours in the Eagle.  She walks you through its cockpit systems.  With the exception of two of the classified systems, it's exactly the same as it was when I was flying it.  I thought she did a good job of explaining the what and why of it all.  I'd give it a 9 on the juvat watchability scale.  Especially if you've ever wondered what all those dials and things do.

Hopefully, Sarge has refueled his book writing machine and has another chapter in the works.  I'm beginning to worry about the "boys" again after he/they took a well deserved holiday.  Is anybody else storing them up for a week, so as to read them more like an actual book?  I think they read better that way.


Y'all hang in there, hug your loved ones and tell 'em ya love 'em. (It'll make all of you feel better.)