I brought a few block bricks down for temporary steps and some bags of concrete that was leftover from my previous concrete work here. They have been nice and dry stored in the shop in Palo Alto. I don't have much storage here. Then I was off to get 20 more bags of concrete. I then poured some concrete to patch the drain crossing the front walkway. After lunch, I then broke out some damaged walkway and poured that too. That pour was finished late about 1500 so the finishing went well into the night. Without the sun, it really takes some time to cure.
About 1500 there appeared a lot of traffic on our nice residential street in front of the house (above left). I learned later that it was because the police closed 10th Street, a couple of blocks from the house because a gunman was reported in the business building at San Jose State University. It's finals week which was likely the cause of the report since they didn't find anyone. While that was going on my but was in the air as I was finishing the concrete with a potential gunman in a tower building two blocks away. Helicopters and TV trucks were busing the area. The helicopters moved to another emergency a short time later when a jumper caused the closure of Freeway 680. That closure caused another bunch of extra traffic through the neighborhood as well. Busy day for the police. My dinner was from Subway. There $2 meatball sandwich can't be beat. It's 2345 and I'm still waiting to do the final finish then to do the brush finish of the concrete.
Tuesday: (12/09) Breakfast from La Victoria Restaurant. It was overcast all day. I spent the morning prepping the driveway to patch. Final filling and final height of the embedded drain inlets and cleanout. I also formed for a flower bed by the atrium. With all that done I started pouring after 1000, early by yesterday;s standards. i only had 12 bags of concrete and knew I'd need more but i decided to pour what i had before heading off to replenish. I had poured a little more than half so I bought 12 more bags. Better to have more than less. I finished placing the concrete about 1300 2 hours earlier than yesterday. I cleaned up the work area and did some finishing and it was 1600. I stopped by Subway for lunch/dinner. I did the final finishing about 2300.
Wednesday: (12/10) Breakfast at La Victoria. What can I say, it's a habit and their burrito lasts.
Today was cleanup day. I loaded the Jeep with Concrete debris and dirt and drove it home to Palo Alto to dump. I picked up lunch on the way at Dim Sum King. I also stopped by Harbor Freight to get my sump pump and they were out. Darn, probably folks preparing for our bad storm tomorrow. Above are the two walkway patches.
Two ways to look at the driveway trench patch.
Above let the front walkway with it's two patches. A flower bed by the atrium.
Above left the fireplace cleanout is a bit below what should have been the top of the concrete so the concrete had to take a dip to allow the door to open. I hope it does actually open when i try to use it after the concrete is really dry enough. Now the driveway pavement looks really bad. Some day it needs to be replaced but not now.
When I returned to San Jose I loaded the Jeep with more dirt. It holds 17-18 five gallon buckets which I estimate to be about 1400-1500 pounds. Above left most of my dirt pile is gone, just some good top soil left. I was busy cleaning up concrete spatter and such. I also cleaned the rain gutters and installed a few temporary down spouts. We're supposed to get heavy winds and 3-4 inches of rain tomorrow, a serious storm for this area. Note the dangling black drain lines acting as temporary downspouts.
I met Lou and Dawn at Applebee's for dinner. When I got home I emptied the dirt out of the Jeep. I don't want it to have to remain there through the weekend due to a really wet yard.
No comments:
Post a Comment