Friday update on the excitement

On the way to the postbox I snapped the developing development. A lot of good quality fill has been installed in a big hole that was dug, there have been surveyors and sticks poked in and we believe that "footings" are soon to be added. Closely followed by a concrete day and then, before you know it, a house and all that goes with it.

We watch, from behind the curtains, making notes and discussing our adopted project. It is all we can do until the sun decides to stay out, on a brighter note, we are off to Quality farms now to look at shrubs.

Love is in the Air

Despite the weather, our feathered friends on the Sunshine Coast have certainly been at it, there is seldom the "no I have a headache" or "we should wait until we're married" although there is a lot of "look out, it's a giant with an optical digital recording device" and "stop messing about" the latter in a feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic, egg laying vertebrate version of a Kenneth Williams voice.

Piglet, down at the Marina, waiting for the inevitable.

Old Codger

We actually managed to be out and about around the garden and garage this week, temperature picked up for a few days and we had some sun. Of course, today supposedly being a paddling day it was windy, overcast and threatening rain. No complaints though, besides all the complaining that is.

Cleared

A full day of backwards and forwards with the truck filled with earth, roots and logs has resulted in the clearance of the plot for what we think will be 715 Tricklebrook Way. It was with big smiles that we realized that at least two of the big Douglas Fir trees will be saved as they are actually not on the development property.

Hopefully, the developers have finished their tree cutting and will keep the remaining three evergreens seen here.

Temporary Driveway

Today the temporary gravel driveway went in across the road, the digger, after grading it, started loading up the big truck to ferry all the cut logs and roots to the dump site. All this as the rain poured.

In an unrelated story, we managed to get out for a paddle this morning in a tight window between the high winds and the heavy rain, a short venture around the breakwater and the Government wharf area, some heavy paddling as the wind was switching direction quickly. The rain started with a vengeance as we hoisted the outrigger out of the water, great timing and broke our duck for March.

Flax Bread

Five cups whole wheat flour, half cup bran, half cup ground flax, tablespoon of flax seed, four teaspoons of sugar, four of yeast, one salt. One and three quarters cups of water. Rise time one hour, four hundred degree oven, thirty minutes, time to first slice in bellies about three minutes after that.

Pink Elephants

Little one on day three of his cold weather pain killers, it's an opiate and we believe he is seeing a fair number of pink elephants about the place. He has brightened up a bit, being a bit silly at times, but is still the just William that we are used to.

Changes

A man in another truck arrived this morning and corrected the Tricklebrook road sign (one end of the road was spelled Tricklebrook and our end Trickelbrook) - all fixed now.

Behind the curtains weekly

Today, after a week of cutting down the smaller "weed" trees a digger has arrived on the Wakefield work site across the road. Strangely enough, fives minutes after arriving the delivery dump truck and float, and the driver of the digger who had arrived in the silver pickup truck, vanished into thin air leaving the digger on the land.

This afternoon he turned up again and was doing digger things, pulling up stumps, moving big logs. All exciting stuff from behind the curtains.

Little Bill

The boys will be seventeen years old in a few months, which according to the charts is about 85 years old in human years, Ben has his hyperthyroidism under control, Bill is veering in that direction but also suffers (like I do) from Arthritis.

Times have changed from the days of "All Creatures Great and Small" and Siegfried Farnon's cottage veterinary practice. We took Bill to the vet yesterday, just to see why he was grinding his teeth sometimes while eating like a three toed sloth. The young vet, who was off on vacation next week, was tiptoeing around his grumpiness, even at one point donning what appeared to be oven gloves while trying to look in his mouth.

The vet said "let's start by doing this, that and the other" and retreated to the back room, within two minutes his lovely assistant arrived with a piece of paper, demanding approval and a signature. I did not have my glassses with me, but even my old eyes spotted that the bill was almost five hundred dollars. Sixty of which was for the inspection, the bulk of the rest was for bloodwork.

We settled on the inspection and a trial course of pain medication for the little one, days of bloodwork and numbers on a piece of paper mean very little now that the only thing we want him to be is comfortable.

I'm not knocking the system as times have changed from James Herriot's world and we people are more likely to litigate our vets than bake them a cake. Yet, I do yearn for those "try this" days when a vet would send you home with a bottle of tincture and a smile, and a hopeful "lets see how that works"

Marine Drive

The last leg of the walk to Gramma's Pub, this is some of the Squamish Nation land that is being developed for the rich and famous, waterfront property with the North Shore mountain view, along with a bit of decent shoreline.

Rover

This chap has not moved an inch over the last three and a half years we have been on this coastline, probably needs a bit of WD40 to get those wheels rolling again. Located on our walk down from Reed Road, through Vista Ridge to Marine drive.

Vista Ridge

We seem to extract great pleasure from other peoples projects, Vista Ridge is one of them and the first three houses have been built there. They have this sort of view which is a bit sordid, but I suppose someone has to put up with it.

Three Coyote Day

We had an across the world Skype session with the sister-in-law and her hubby, a few minutes before we were looking out of the window at our modified view and Karen spotted a couple of coyotes run past, we raced to the back of the house and saw three young, healthy looking, coyotes race through the back yard, closely followed by a local dog in pursuit.

No pictures as they were so quick, so here is a young eagle we spotted at Vista Ridge on our walk to the pub this afternoon.

The Man Cometh

I was off foraging for stuff at the charity shops this morning and I missed the man, he cometh and he taketh away the four trees that were interfering with the hydro pole. Well, he didn't taketh everything away, he leaveth a big pile of firewood for nexteth wintereth.

I admit, I liked them better as trees, but hey, it was the man.

Day One

We will officially call this day one in the project across the road, there have been comings and goings but today the man, along with his spirit level, spent three hours putting up the sign.

It looks like the project is going to be undertaken by Wakefield Homes, a respected builder on the coastline.

Signs of Life

There are buds and sprouts everywhere in the garden, we have grown tired of the winter and it seems that it knows it has overstayed it's welcome.