We decided to take care of bringing the utilities ourselves. How hard could it be? The Songers did all their own. It basically entailed digging a trench and making some phone calls to the utility companies - right?
WRONG.
Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the biggest headache of the project so far. Lesson learned for the next people: Hire your contractor to bring the utilities.
Exhibit 1: The Vault. That big concrete box is a new requirement. It goes beneath the transformer. It keeps the transformer from settling and becoming crooked. $1050. Pretty much everything extra is about a grand. An outstretched fistful.
Casey G. dug our trench for us for a song. And some cookies. Bless his soul. Then he went hunting. He wasn't going to be back for two weeks when he could back-fill it. (Note: I'm am writing this post 2 weeks later, we're not ready to back-fill yet.)
The Cresaps were up that day, and we stayed outside all day watching the trenching and rockets.
Got a good sunburn and found a fuzzy bear caterpillar. (Anyone know the real name of these prickly fellas?)
it's a wooly bear. real name. larva of the isabella tiger moth. we've gotten into caterpillars this summer and hatched a few butterflies. the coolest caterpillar we caught was a black fuzzy one about the size of a mouse(!) that turns into a gorgeous and huge white and black spotted leopard moth. we didn't hatch him though because they over-winter in their cocoons and that was too much pressure for me. careful with those fuzzy ones, they often excrete toxic stuff that can give you an itchy rash. nice trench by the way, it would be fun for playing "escape the nazis" or "escape the east germans" or "escape bedtime."
ReplyDeletebless you for going through this and passing on gems of knowledge to those who might/WANT to build there. seems like a real adventure.
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