Thursday, January 15, 2009

Got'r'did

Got a call bright and early from my old next door neighbor Robin, back in upstate NY. She is the brilliant inventor of the whipwatch... http://www.whipwatch.net/ Robin called to chat and complain about the cold NE and that her furnace was running non stop. They are really getting hammered by super cold weather this winter. A couple of years ago - we had a weeks worth of sub zero temps that prompted me to make ice sculptures since it was too cold to do anything else. My favorite was to fill water balloons and set them out to freeze overnight. Next day I would peal off the balloons and build pyramids with the ice balls and put a light in them at night ....or break off icicles from Robins roof and stick them all over a frozen ice ball to make a star. Those were the good ol' cold days. We had a high of 72 here at the Field Lab today...

Was feeling a bit out of sorts this morning so in order to prolong the agony that is mixing concrete by hand - I whiled away the morning by doing just a little more prep work. Pre-rewarded my efforts by treating myself to a sausage,egg, and cheese on Texas toast over at the Grub Shack. Reward in stomach, it was time to get to work. Propped up tower one in place and tweaked it around a bit ( boy, I sure hope this looks right on GoogleEarth someday). Took about three hours to get my water ready, mix up 9.5 bags of concrete and do the pour. I always place a coin in every pour I do. Finished up so early that I built a new compost bin for my unmentionables. Going to transfer my first years worth of "all that came out of me" and close it off to cook for another year. Look for the first batch of "PooMatoes" in the summer of 2010.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Love your work, came here from boing boing will check in often!

Joe said...

An ignorant question, but why the coin in the pour?
I've been reading since Ara mentioned you and I came on over.

Anonymous said...

What coin was it? A Texas or New York quarter? Or a Bi-Centennial quarter? Or a buffalo nickel? Or just whatever was handy?

We just placed my parent's driveway and sidewalk. I tired to put a few coins in there, but mom objected :(

Anonymous said...

Great blog. I'll be following along with interest.

Wasn't aware that you could compost human waste... is that hygenic? Just wondering.

My wife and are hoping to retire to an isolated piece of farm land and hope to live at least somewhat 'off the grid'. Your experiences will inform that decision.
Thanks and good luck!

T said...

I've been trying to find you on google maps but can't seem to track you down. What are your coordinates?