When we decided to build our forever house, there were four things that I wanted to be bulletproof. The roof, the windows, the doors, and the cabinetry hardware. By bulletproof, I mean of such high quality that they would never become a maintenance issue or the source of aggravation. I have had to repair or replace drawer slides in every house we have ever lived in or worse yet, resigned myself to living with a sub standard user experience. This will not be the case at the River House. The drawer slides I have selected are manufactured by Blum and I put a sample set through my torture testing and have determined they will stand the test of time. They also support a push-to-open capability that will be used on all the drawers throughout the house. At $60 a set, they are not cheap but I much prefer this solution to a lower quality $40 slide and a $20 handle. Another important benefit is the ease of and degrees of freedom when adjusting for proper alignment. Not a big deal when you are installing a couple of drawers and can spend time tweaking each one. When you will be installing more than 100, every bit of time saving pays big dividends.

I met Tony Bennet at the funeral of my uncle Ernie, pictured above with his wife, Barbara. Instead of speaking about his long-time friend and occasional guitar accompanist, Tony delivered an acapella tribute that reverberated through the small church. I do not remember the story of how they met, but both had parents who were born in the Calabria region of Italy and immigrated to the United States. I think I remember reading in my father’s autobiography that Tony would often join the family for dinner at my grandparent’s house in Brooklyn. Unfortunately, that book is packed in a box somewhere and will not go back on a shelf until we move into the new house. Also in storage is a painting that Tony made as a gift to my uncle who left it for my father. I found it when cleaning out my childhood home before we sold it. At the time, I did not realize that Tony was the painter because it was signed Benedetto. Only later did I learn that was the way he signed all of his art work. I am looking forward to rediscovering it when we get settled.

Tony Bennet started life with next to nothing and worked his way to stardom. As is often the story, his success led him to excesses that nearly cost him his life and career. When he hit rock bottom, he reached out to his sons who helped him to reinvent himself and went on to recapture and even extend his former glory.

The trench that will carry power, fiber optic, and cable to our new house was completed today and the bottom was filled with sand. We are hoping to lay the conduits starting on Monday when our electrician returns from vacation. The backhoe operator managed to very neatly pile the excavated material in such a way that a car can still navigate the driveway. I was expecting the work to block all traffic so this is very helpful. Once this trench is backfilled, work moves to the other side of the driveway where a much deeper trench will be made for the water main.

In preparation for trenching which is scheduled to start tomorrow, the stumps and roots for the recently felled trees that directly border the driveway were removed. To leave them would have created a future problem as they decay leaving behind a sunken area in the ground. Given their proximity to the driveway, we deemed it necessary to have them removed.

I completed carcass construction for the floating vanities that will go in bathrooms 2 and 3. They are actually stacked one on top of the other in the photo above. The indented shelf on the side is where the toilet paper holder will go as well as two spare rolls. The vanity on the bottom has the indented shelf on the opposite side and has yet to receive the counter top with sink basin. I will install the drawer hardware next and then apply a hard wax oil finish to the outside surfaces before mounting it to the wall. Building (or possibly buying) the drawer boxes and attaching the drawer fronts will be the final step.

Jeanine is now able to bear weight on her foot again, at least for short periods of time and limited distances. She has quite an impressive array of pins and screws that were used to align her bones. The surgery went so well that she is considering having her other foot done after Thanksgiving. It is a lot to go through in a single year but this type of procedure is best done sooner rather than later.

My baby sister likes showing off her guns. Not too shabby for a 58-year-old. My brother and I used to tussle all the time as kids. The thought of doing so with my sisters never entered my mind. Good thing, because now despite my considerable experience as a wrestler, I would not want to tangle with Mayela. I am fairly confident I can still take my other two sibs, however.

I finally got down to some cabinet construction at the River House. I cut all the carcass components and glued up the edge banding for the vanities that will go in bathrooms 2 & 3. I also devoted considerable time in the evening to ordering components for a router table. I have decided to use lock miter joints for stair tread construction and really need a proper router table to make them. Surprisingly, it is the one piece of common shop equipment that you can not purchase as a fully assembled machine of any substance. Instead, you need to source all of the components and build your own. Normally, I would enjoy such a project, but given my other priorities, I would happily just have a completed unit delivered.

At the northernmost point of Nantucket within the Coskata-Coatue Wildlife Reserve, you’ll find the most powerful light in New England! Officially named the Nantucket Light, it was first erected in 1784 as a wooden tower. A fire destroyed the little wooden lighthouse in 1816, and so a second tower – this time made of stone – was built in 1818. The stone tower fell over in 1984 and was replaced by the existing lighthouse, a 60-foot replica of the original. Jeanine is staying on Nantucket for the weekend with friends from her book group. They visited the site by way of a 7-mile drive along the beach after having reduced the air pressure in their tires to facilitate traction on the sand.

After weeks of delay, the bamboo plywood I have been waiting for finally arrived. Unfortunately, the convoluted journey it was subjected to because of the failure to arrange for the agreed delivery method in the first place, took its toll. A close look at the photo reveals that the shipping pallet was damaged leaving one corner of the stack unsupported. As a result, the core of the bottom sheet was fractured. The top sheet bears the scars of a forklift suggesting that something was carelessly stacked on top at some point during the transit. Finally, the entire load was left in the rain at some point resulting in water staining on every sheet. Even though each sheet was individually wrapped in plastic, at some point the plastic was sliced along one edge leaving an opening to every panel. It is possible that I will be able to remove some of these stains by sanding them out but that remains to be seen. At $300 a sheet, this damage represent a costly issue. I have started to work with the vendor to make things right. Part of the process was careful documentation. Over the course of 5 hours, I unwrapped each sheet one at a time, photographed the water stains on both sides and placed it onto a new stack. At nearly 40 pounds a piece this was quite the workout. The good news, is that even if I have to cut off the damaged ends, I still have enough material to get started with cabinet making.

When a new home is constructed to replace one that is more than 50 years old, Concord Water Department regulations require that the main water line be replaced from the street to the house. Given our heavily wooded lot, the only option is to run the new pipe below our driveway. The new pipe must be buried deeper than 4 feet, requiring a rough trench depth of 5 feet. The company that will do the excavation made it clear that the root systems for the large pine trees adjacent to the driveway would be compromised and that they would not survive. They strongly recommended we remove the trees ahead of excavation so that the root balls could be removed as well. With trenching set to begin early next week, we had to scramble to get town approval to remove the trees (Concord has a Tree Preservation bylaw) and to find a company able to schedule the work on short notice. Fortunately, we were successful on both fronts. Today, a four person crew and 110 ton crane showed up to harvest the 100+ foot tall trees. The straight trunks will be picked up tomorrow and milled into lumber.

I had planned to start cabinet fabrication today but another snafu with the bamboo plywood forced me to refuse delivery. More on this later. Instead, I turned my attention to the installation of four medicine cabinets. Although not a difficult task, I proceeded with great care so as not to damage any of the four mirrors (front of the door, back of the door, back of the cabinet, and adjustable magnifying mirror) or four glass shelves on each of these Robern units. Everything went smoothly.

Back to the bamboo. I will be fabricated all of the cabinetry throughout the house from bamboo plywood. 36 sheets to be exact from a company called CALI floors . After weeks of delay, it finally showed up today but on the wrong type of truck. Had I accepted delivery, it would have meant carrying one sheet at a time down the 300-foot driveway. This is precisely why I specified and paid for delivery on a flatbed truck with a piggyback forklift so that the entire pallet could be offloaded in one fell swoop and placed neatly in the new garage. Unfortunately, with driveway excavation for our new water main scheduled to begin Monday, any delay beyond then would now be measured in weeks since the driveway will be impassable during this phase of the work. Furthermore, the driveway will be blocked by a 110 ton crane all day tomorrow due to tree work. This means that the plywood has to be delivered on Friday. After I was unable to speak directly to anyone who could help me, I reached out to the President of the company and pled my case. To his credit he immediately got the right person working the issue and she very quickly sorted things out with the shipping company. Knock-on-wood, the plywood will arrive on Friday.

The last of our interior doors was installed today. The two-man team doing the work are both from Ukraine. I have been extremely impressed with their attention to detail and craftsmanship. I am equally pleased with the doors themselves and particularly with the hardware. We selected concealed hinges and magnetic latches. Operating the doors is a real pleasure and the sound of the latch engaging is both muted and confidence inspiring.

Although we are still scrambling to determine our interior color pallet, the outside color scheme is now finalized. The body of the house is a color called Peppercorn (a dark grey), the trim will be black, and the horizontal accents and soffits are Rust. It took a while to reach closure but Jeanine and I are equally happy with the final look. Now if we can just close out the interior color choices we will be off to the races.

Guess where the 12″ high, black house numbers will go.

TMI Warning

My efforts to drink more water throughout the day have dramatically reduced the number of kidney stones I produce. During the last few weeks, however, I have worked very long days at the River House. Combined with very high temperatures, I have been more dehydrated than usual. Predictably, this has given rise to a new batch of kidney stones. This one, the largest of eight I have passed over the last two days, measured 3mm and has a composition I have not observed before. Kidney stones are composed of combinations of calcium, oxalate, urate, cystine, xanthine, and phosphate. When I have more free time, I will try to figure out what the reddish addition is to my normal calcium oxalate stones.