Thursday, September 28, 2006

Interesting Interlude!

The last few days have been a bit of a blur! I think today is Thursday - I'm not sure though unless I think about it really hard!

Yesterday! I can remember what happened yesterday! After two hours at home working in the office, Peter and I found ourselves spending the rest of the day at the building site. The framer decided to give over his scissor lift to Peter so the remainder of the beam could be stained. Tuesday night, the north side and part of the west side was stained. Peter was able to do that after the framers working hours, so the scissor lift was available then. It worked so much better than trying to do it with a ladder! All this time I was down on terra firma (!) staining rafters. So Tuesday night and Wednesday all day (until dark!) was used up staining! But hey - now this morning I can say the beam is stained it's nice dark "River Rock" color and most of the rafters are finished with their mid-toned "Clay" color. We were color matching the rafters etc to the window color. Sounds like tomorrow (Friday!) they are coming to be installed. Any wonder I can't keep it all straight - things are moving along quickly again. Right now as I type up this post the main floor entry doors are going in!

So a quick review of our part in the weeks events:

Monday evening - staining most of the fascia boards.
Tuesday evening - staining part of the beam and some rafters.
Wednesday day and evening - more staining of beam and rafters.
Thursday morning - bit of prep work for main floor door installation and preparing to move some lumber so front sidewalk and pad gravel can be put down. Later when the sun shines (forecast says it will!) I will go finish up the rafters

Yesterday as well we got some walls installed upstairs in our suite!!! We had pizza supper in the room designed for meeting customers! Sorry - no picture yet of the upstairs. Never thought of it at the time! The framer had little choice but to move inside while we finished up some of the outside finishes. I don't think he had a big problem with it at all! When we left the site this morning Leon and Todd were loading the scissor lift with another load of lumber to take around to Peter's window and unload into the "offices to be" of PJB Design Consultants. We are almost blown away driving up to the builidng these days. We are blessed beyond our comprehension!!

Here are some pictures we did get this week so far!



Leon and Todd installing the beam



Last time looking out my 2nd floor window and see someone chatting!



The reason I am doing the rafters!
This is work for Peter instead!

NOW for my interesting interlude!!

While we were working yesterday a gentleman stopped by our site. We turned around - and there he was!! He introduced himself as Sid Long. We had received his name from a couple of different people in town saying he was an important person to talk to about the original station building. I had talked to his wife a few weeks ago but we hadn't made arrangements yet to meet with them. And there he was!! Peter kept on working and I spent about an hour or so chatting with him about Lacombe in the 50's and his part in the station. He was involved in the freight area of the station doing accounting - I believe it was. I'll know more after we visit with him and his wife. Apparently there was a functioning second floor in the 1911 Lacombe Station. Even though the CP blueprints don't indicate it - there was a stationmaster's office and a lunch room upstairs. Also there was a basement that was originally used for a coal burning furnace for heating. Somewhere along the life of the building, this concrete basement had an interior wall added and part of it was turned into a bomb shelter or bunker. The things we are finding out! Mr Long is a very interesting 89 year old gentleman with many stories to tell. He is going to talk with another fellow in town Roy Richmond who also worked at the station in his CPR career and see if we can all meet together. We look forward to listening in on their reminiscing!



Visiting with Mr. Long




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