As I have said elsewhere, I am a carpenter. I have no business whatsoever telling anyone how to install security cameras or a home network. This is just how I have done it after watching many YouTube videos by people who don’t know either. My way may be wrong but it is working for me. Your mileage may vary.
We needed new security cameras. The old ones were, well, old, and resolution has improved dramatically over the past seven or eight years since we bought them. I watched a lot of YouTube videos (of course) and read a lot of articles weighing the pros and cons of each type and brand of camera and system.
I was recently asked by the YouTube channel, SHELTER MODE, if he could feature our container house on his channel. He asked for a short story about our build and for some construction photos. In sorting through thousands of photos, I thought, hey, why not make a post about it for him. And anyone visiting here for the first time could see some of the process we went through without plowing through all 200-plus posts. Here is the story. At the end are a lot of photos from the way-back machine. Continue reading →
To recap from my last post, I have for some years now wanted to try my hand at aquaponics. Aquaponics involves fish and vegetable growing. In short, the fish excrete ammonia, which is toxic to the fish. But bacteria process the ammonia and produce nitrite and then nitrate. Vegetable plants are grown in the water that is rich with the nitrates, feeding the plants, and then the water is returned to the fish. It is a nearly closed loop system, just needing input of fish food and an occasional small dose of, for example, iron. But to do all this at the scale I want, I need a greenhouse. Continue reading →
PART I ~ A Very Long-winded Introduction To A Significant Project
Sorry, no pictures this post.
Time sensitive note: I’ve wanted to write this post for some time, but the COVID-19 pandemic kinda knocked the wind out of my sails. But today I determined to sit down and write. I hope you are all well. We are watching the world change in front of our eyes.
For some years now, I have wanted to grow our own veges. But our soil is rock hard and would need significant augmentation to be successful soil. And if the bugs flying in the air and/or the leaf cutter ants marching on the ground don’t eat the leaves, then the grubs underground will eat the roots. And then there are the rabbits. And the windy season would leave the leaves in tatters. And the dry season requires constant watering as the soil turns to stone. And the torrential flooding in the rainy season is no help either. And who wants to bend over and work the soil at 70+ years old anyway. The only dastardly thing we are missing here is deer! So I tabled the desire. Continue reading →
Oh-six-hundred hours, Wednesday. January 1st, 2020. “The guest bedroom is too brown,” Cynthia said to me as I woke to her words. “Oh, good morning. Happy New Year to you, too,” I said in return. She had been semi-awake for some time slumber-daydreaming about the guest bedroom and the words just kind of slipped out of her mouth. Continue reading →
About a year ago Armando and I built a planter wall so that Cynthia and I could have some orchids. We poured a sizable foundation to support the twelve-foot tall wall and embedded a few vertical pieces of rebar to also support the wall. We attached a piece of foam building panel to the rebars ~ I used this same foam stuff elsewhere in the house construction ~ it has a core of Styrofoam with a wire mesh on both sides. You plaster the panel with stucco. Of course we chose the wettest time of the year…
Looking out the kitchen window, waiting for the water to recede.
In this post I am going to tell you about a recent day that Cynthia and I had. It has nothing to do with our house. I’m going to make a political point at the end though, so fair warning.
A few weeks ago, Cynthia was in the States on family business. On the day she returned to Panama she got up at about 4:00 a.m. to make her flight. Here are some specific moments of her day: Continue reading →
Back in 2009 Cynthia and I had just bought this property. It was going to be a few months while she and I created the house plan and the architect did his work and got all the approval stamps. I was sitting in the house that we were renting and I was bored. I needed a hobby.
Hi there. I bet you thought you would never hear from me again. Well I’m back with an update and possibly a reboot of this blog. For those who want more shipping container house building info, my future posts may be disappointing. The container part of the house build is done and it has been done for more than three years now. `
For the past three-and-a-half years, this shipping container/art house has been for sale. As in much of the world, the housing market here is absolutely flat. Only a couple of properties have sold here and they were priced well below what the sellers wanted and way below what we were asking.
Meanwhile, Cynthia and I have been living here. Real living and not just the five-year all-consuming exertion of creating and building this house. We’ve had time to be creative with our arts. We’ve had time to just sit and relax in the master bedroom porch and watch the birds. We’ve had time to know each other more deeply. As time passed, we explored other places to live when the house would potentially sell. Medellin, Colombia (we’ve been there five times now). Guanajuato, Mexico (wow, but stairs, stairs, and more stairs make it not a place for Cynthia with her new knee). Greenville, South Carolina (fair weather, progressive culture, health care, etc.) and Austin, Texas (Cynthia’s family).
But through all this time, two factors have become important priorities.
One factor is that we love the rich nature and relative seclusion of where we are. Every morning we wake to something we’ve never had before. Recently it has been a family of Aracaris (Toucan like birds). And the flock of wild parrots absolutely prevents sleeping in and missing these wonderful mornings. To start over somewhere else and miss a significant amount of time (years?) without just sitting and being has become a less inviting idea.
The second factor is really a matter of time and energy. We have created something here and it took a lot of energy and a lot of years: this custom house that is a joy to live in, a workshop that I have organized for the first time in my life, a new glass studio for Cynthia, a watercolor painting studio for me, and more is in the works. We want these things in our life and to start over with the diminished energy of age is looking more and more unlikely and un-enjoyable.
As an example of what I am doing when not building a house, here is a cabinet I built for my art supplies:
The wood is a tropical cedar with Purple Heart drawer fronts.Diamond plate aluminum drawer bottoms save space and so far the termites don’t like it.
So with a substantial and significant amount of pondering, realizing, and talking, we have come to the “ah-ha!” decision to remove the house from the market. Not that it is selling anyway, but we have come to settle on all the good points of staying put.
Over the next while I will post Part II of the reserve water tank project, our studios, an orchid wall that I built, and a major project that is underway.
We’ve been thinking about building a reserve water tank, and here are some reasons why:
Reason 1. A few weeks ago, a neighbor set a small fire of yard debris, then left for his house in the city. (I know, I know, I will refrain from comment…) A few hours later, Cynthia looked out our kitchen window and yelled, “FIRE!” I knew that that house didn’t have any water as a new well was being drilled. So I ran to the neighbor of the property on fire and roused the sleeping caretaker. Continue reading →
