Memorable weekend...

No work in the treehouse department, though...

We spent the bulk of our Memorial Day weekend in NJ visiting with Lisa, Kevin and the girls. Kevin nabbed 3 tix for the Saturday night Pearl Jam show at the Tweeter Center in Camden...and gave the 10th row seats to Nate and I! Need I add that Nate was blown away by his first concert. Dad was, too. A little tailgating, some great tunes- Q time for the guys. Thanks, Kev!

jt, meanwhile was busy playing the pied piper to the twins as acting older cousin. He appeared to really enjoy the role. Lisa & Kevin took in the PJ show Sunday night post barbeque while Esther, Nate, jt and I hung with the girls.

On Monday we had some freinds over for a barbeque and spent some time catching up. Nate and his pal broke out their guitars and serenaded us for a bit. Well, perhaps "serenade" wouldn't be the correct term, as Nate let loose with a solid Jimi Hendrix inspired rendition of The Star Spangled Banner!

Happy Memorial Day!

Uncle Kevin's Tools...

Looks like my brother has just the heavy duty drill we'll need to to get these GL's mounted in our trees and ready to rock and roll! He also lent us his "chop" mitre saw today. Add to that that this project has apparently peaked his interest so much that he has offered to come "play" with us this Memorial Day weekend.

Once those GL's are up Uncle Kevin says, "We could frame that thing in a day."

With jt's birthday in three weeks- pizza-party-in-a-treehouse ring a bell!? -that kind of thinking is music to our ears!

Do you want electricity in this thing?

Yeee-haaa!!

You said it!

What's new?...

Been a few days since we last posted an update here. A combination of copious amounts of weekend rains combined with a little uncertainty in our engineering (read: math) department have led to a brief stall in our treehouse quest.

Seeing as how this wire rope represents the hypothenus of a triangle in our treehouse plans, it was imperitive that we determine it's length in order to move forward. A little hunting around and I came up with the time worn mathematical equation that we needed.

__(a squared-distance from bottom GL to eyebolt)
+ (b squared-distance from bottom GL to top GL)
__________________________________________
__c squared- distance from top GL to eyebolt

Subtract from that the length of one half way opened turnbuckle and we're looking to order that wire rope this week!

How 'bout that?...

It looks like we may have gotten lucky already. I got a response to an email I sent to the Active Door & Window Co.:

hey! i got your message about the tree house and i think we could help....we definatly have some items here we could get to you at cheap
price....let me know exactly what you are looking for or just stop by at our holtsville location. i know for sure we have a cutdown 9ft door unit that may work well....its been here for a year or so and we are looking to get rid of it. we also have a lot of vinyl windows of assorted sizes.

just let me know what would work best for you.

thanks,
bob jr.

Yes!

Going, going...

...gone!

The contractor bulldozed our goldmine yesterday. The very morning they got their permit. Windows. Door. Everything. All razed and stuffed into a dumpster.

Just like that.

Yesterday at the bus stop our neighbor the owner had reassured me that she would keep us posted. When jt and I arrived at the bus stop this morning, she told me how sorry she was, but that there was nothing she could do about it. The contractor called and told her to meet the crew there. I told her of course there wasn't anything she could do. When a contractor is ready to roll you have to let them roll.

I should've pushed to get in there this past weekend. Oh well. Windows and a door go back on our list.

Maybe we'll get a response from a couple of the window/door places that I emailed today looking for "scratch and dent" or overage inventory.

I didn't even tell jt about all of this yet. I will when I find something else.

Awaiting word on windows and a door...

Still no definitive word regarding a firm demolition date on the house that is to provide us with our working windows and one very cool dutch door. This weekend would have been a perfect time to do our own little "demolition" job on the house, but the owners are awaiting word from their demo crew.

I can understand them wanting to know when the house is coming down before turning us loose on the place. A missing door and windows would be an invitation to unwanted guests. She says, "Any day now."

A week day after work would be tough...but at least I do have lanterns.

About a tree cutting...

Apparently our little tree cutting escapade this past weekend inspired jt to put pencil to paper in class. Here it is, just as he wrote it:

Once I pulled down a tree! At first my dad was holding a roap and man was I confused and then I said "whats the roap for" I said. he said "first I'm going to get a chansoo to cut it to get it to loose it's balins so that the roap can pull it down. We trid the plan four times and finale it worked and I ran away. and at night we cut it apart and put it into piles.

"Awesome!" is what Mrs P had to say.

I concur.

UNIROPE to the rescue!...

As I mentioned eariler, I sent emails to several companies in a quest for a custom wire rope solution, but to no avail. I then resent those emails to the very same companies.

Nada.

I decided to hunt down yet another company in the wire rope business, and give them a whirl. I found one located in Mississauga, Ontario that fit the bill and copied them with the very same email...

...and "Voila!"- here's what we got:

Hi Tom and jt,

I will be happy to supply these cables to you. The specs are as follows:1/2" x 7ft 6x26 IWRC, EIPS, RRL, Galvanized complete with 8 inch x 4 inch loop on each end. The loops are Manufactured with Uni-Loc® Flemish Eye Splices and each sling is rated at a Working Load Limit of 2.3 Tons.

The cost per cable is US$25.41 plus Shipping and Handling. Payment will be required by Visa prior to shipping.

If you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact me.

Good luck with the project!

Regards,-- Justin Brown

Wire Rope and Rigging Consultant

UNIROPE SLINGMAX3070 Universal DriveMississauga, ONl4X 2C8

It looks like we're in business!