If you must play, decide on three things at the start: the rules of the game, the stakes, and the quitting time. - Chinese Proverb  At long last, it finally happened! After numerous attempts Including 47 we recorded for posterity Oh, and here's our Hanabi sound track

Here's a design I came up with this weekend for a monoslope roof. Granted, it's not terribly original nor natural it should do the job and be relatively easy to construct. Sheathed with plywood and metal panels. Here's the framing detail for the roof. We'll infill the side jack walls with cob and wine bottles(something like the picture below)

One of my newest interests/obsessions are puzzle rooms (also referred to as escape rooms). In a puzzle room, you and a small group of people are "locked" in a room (or series of rooms). There are clues, riddles and locks scattered about the room that when pieced together, ciphered out and unlocked, lead to a key that lets you out of the room. Note, that there's a moderator in the room and you're not really locked in. If you have to go to the bathroom, need answer a phone call or your head just explodes you can get out. You have one hour to solve everything and get out. The puzzles require good observation skills, pattern recognition, organization, minute attention to detail and sometimes some pretty large logical jumps. Communicating with your team is really key. I've been to Puzzle Room Austin three times this year and this third time we finally escaped. Failure! We couldn't escape the Befuddler's lair allowing him to wreak havoc on the city. ...

Summer has definitely arrived. It got up to a balmy 96 degrees today with a heat index over 100 degrees. Fortunately, the heavy lifting is just about over. Over last Friday and today we knocked out the 18th (and final) course. Whew! Installed the door lintel Western wall complete! Yay! The good thing about 90+ degree temperatures is that the mud dries mighty fast. Within half an hour of setting a block I was able to pull off the form and fill in the gaps. Working along the northern wall Filling in the gaps Over the span of 18th courses the mud has really caked on to some of the forms making them difficult to remove. I dismantled this one. Not going to need it anymore in the near future. Filling in more gaps Building temporary forms for the door lintel. Since there will only be about six inches between the lintel and the bond beam I thought it would be best to make the cob about the lintel in one continuous section. These recycled screws w...

Sunday, found us back at the San Marcos river, this time with our friends Michael and Leslie. Michael and Leslie are on their victory lap around Austin and central Texas. Within the week they're moving back to the icy wasteland of sub-southern Canada (they typically refer to it as Minnesota).  We thought maybe the siren's call of the San Marcos river could sway them into sticking around longer but alas. Happy trails ya'll! Of course we didn't take any pictures at the river but we did manage to snag this one in our car park when we got back. Michael and Leslie left us with an extensive collection of herbs and spices (what do you do with cream of tartar?), many fond memories, and several bars of homemade soap. Several months ago Michael made some soap in his chemistry lab. It's finally cured and he gave me a sample made with masculine smelling cedar oil. Hopefully, it doesn't burn my skin off.

Our friend and hiking buddy Ben along with some of his friends visited us this weekend. Over the last few months we'd been trying to organize a hike but have kept having scheduling and weather conflicts. Well, a very wet spring quickly gave way to a very hot early summer. From mid June through September I typically pass on hikes and stick to river and lakes but Ben still wanted to go on a ramble and thus we ended up on a swim/hike along Barton Creek. Barton Creek is flowing with a vengeance right now Hanging out at Sculpture Falls. Board gaming in the evening  

El Niño has given up and summer is upon us. It was all blue sky on Sunday so we decided to take Nicci tubing on the San Marcos River. The current was more brisk than it has been in summers past but the water was as cool and clear as ever. Returning from the river Jean and Nicci put together a picnic dinner and then it was off to Symphony on the Lawn at the Long Center.   

We were delighted to have my friend and former colleague, Nicci, come all the way from the UK to visit us. It was her first visit to Texas, so we had a great time showing her around Austin and the surrounding area. We really packed a lot into four and a half days! She arrived about 4 pm Friday. We'd decided to be kind and didn't plan too much in advance that night, as we were waiting to see how she was coping with the jet-lag. Once she got here we found out she has a step counter in her watch and due to the 10 hour flight she was behind for that day...she also admitted to being willing to stay up for the next few hours....so Aaron had the idea to walk to dinner...just a short stroll...erm....well actually a 2 mile hike through the woods! :) He then gallantly offered to drive and meet us there (so he could drive us back...and conveniently avoid the hike!), but I was having none of that and insisted we get the bus back. So we all walked to Shady Grove. Walking down into the...