last week’s accomplishments – The Vagabond Tabby

or, In Which I Sort Of Failed To Post Any Progress Stuff Last Week

I got the back wall clearcoated. It really brought out the colours in the wood — look at the difference above!

Having accomplished that, I figured I’d start on the back window. Tyvek tape to keep water out of the walls:

The back window is currently just a big hole in the wall with a sheet of plywood covering it on the outside. The inside edge of the window frame is covered in two layers of tyvek tape.

I found a cool pallet board with some of the bark still on & used it for part of the frame:

There's a board covering the left inside edge of the window hole now -- the bark still shows on the narrow edge, which is partly brown.

Et voila, a window frame! Or at least as far as I got that day before the rain really started to pish doon.

The picture shows the right half of the window -- most of the inside edge of the frame is now covered by pallet wood, except for about a foot on the top edge.

It rained pretty much all day the next couple days, so I didn’t get back to working outside until Sunday. At which point … well, there was still water to work around.

My red camping chair, which very usefully has a puddle on the seat about two inches deep.

Really not a good time to be working with this board here.

One of the wide boards I've been using on the back wall is laying on the ground, along with a bunch of scraps of wood of varying sizes. They're all SOAKING wet.

But the pallet boards I’d pulled for the window frame were dry, so I got that done & then clearcoated it.

The back window, now neatly framed all around.

That’s as far as I can get with that window without taking off the plywood over it, which I don’t especially want to do in the middle of the monsoon. Not like there’s any shortage of other stuff to be done, such as making the side door better at keeping water outside.

Look, weatherstripping!

A roll of weatherstripping, about half an inch wide, dark brown with a strip of yellow stuff covering the adhesive.

Look, it’s filling the gap between the door & the trim! Also, now nobody can peek! At least through that bit.

A close view of where the side door meets the trim around it. There's a gap about a quarter inch wide, but all that's visible through it is the edge of the weatherstripping.

Having accomplished that, I set out to get the mail & a couple more salvaged boards. Here’s where I’ve been getting the ones I used for the back wall:

A short length of wood fence, maybe twelve feet wide, with six foot high boards spaced along it. There are pretty good-sized gaps in between the boards.

It’s such gorgeous wood, I can’t just leave it there to rot.

On the way back I stopped to check another abandoned house, & found TREASURE:

An old-style drill press sits in the corner of what's obviously a workshop. It's all metal, none of this modern plastic stuff. The top part is painted teal & there's a LOT of dust on it.

Hell YEAH I’m going back for that with the van. & another pair of hands. Maybe two.

I grabbed these right away, though. Who wouldn’t?

A pair of brace and bit style hand drills. They're a bit rusty but overall look like they're in pretty good shape.

I’m keeping one, & the other’s going to a friend who can’t use power tools. Rockin it old school!

This was posted originally to my Patreon, a little over a week ago.

If you want to see these posts sooner, & not incidentally help support me & my cats in our travels & such, the way to do that is to sign up as one of my Patrons for as little as a buck a month.

I’d REALLY like that.

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