Expecting Company

Door Panel Walls

My daughter and her three kids are coming over for four days, the first week of February.

She told me that she had found a fare on Hawaiian Airlines for $220.00 round trip. I did not believe her.

Three days later, I went on the Hawaiian Airlines website, and sure enough, there was a round trip fare leaving Phoenix on February 4, and returning on February 8th.

On February 4th, for a variety of reasons, they missed the flight! The tickets were non-refundable, non-transferrable. My daughter called Hawaiian Airlines. The Customer Service Agent she talked to confirmed that the tickets were nor-refundable. She asked to speak with a supervisor.

The supervisor was able to issue a refund on the original tickets, and my daughter bought new tickets for the next day, February 5th, and returning on February 10th!

Go figure!

I was kind of hoping that this would not happen. As February got closer, I began to realize that I was not prepared for visitors, and part of me was thinking of canceling their visit!

I had nowhere for them to stay, not enough bedding, and I was concerned about fresh food due to my small refrigerator.

The gazebo at Ahi had a roof, and a floor, and no walls! There was also a section of the floor with a large rock sticking up. when I was here before, i tried to remove this by prying on it with a big prybar, and pounding on it with a sledge hammer to try to at least break it up to below the floor.

I mentioned this to Brian and he told me that he had an electric chipping hammer. that I could borrow it if I helped him with a project . Scott’s water line is sticking above the ground where it crosses Amapela Road. Brian had told Scott that he would bust out the rocks so that the water line could be lowered. I agreed to help with that!

Using Brian’s chipping hammer, I was able to bust out the rocks in the gaxebo floor to below the floor line. Now I can pour this last final portion of the floor.

I also used it to bust up a large rock in the path leading from the driveway.

After removing these rocks, I decided to tackle the project at Amapela Road. No good deed goes unpunished. I found that where Scott’s waterline crossed the road, there were four other waterlines there as well. I was careful not to damage any of the other waterlines as I was chipping out the rocks for a trench below them all. Unfortunately, I nicked one of them, which required my running into Naalehu to the hardware store for the needed fittings to repair it! Like I said, no good deed goes unpunished! I was successful and Scott’s waterline is now buried where it crosses Amapela road!

Then I turned my efforts to building door panels.

I started to make door panels to stand up and secure between the columns.

I figured that I could use three door panels in each of the 6 sections between the columns. That means I would need to make 18 panels.

I set up the table saw and started to fabricate the styles and rails for these door panels.

In the process, I created a lot of sawdust that I can use in the composting toilet!

Using some of the pallets as a work bench, I got to work putting them together.

I also needed to do some taking apart as well as putting together. I took apart more pallets to get the 1″ boards for the interior panels.

Slowly, I built more panels

Slowly, I kept at building panels.

As I stood them up, I had to add reinforcing and blocking in the ceiling to hold them from falling over.

I ripped some 2 x 4’s and screwed them to the ceiling joists – one part inside, and one part outside. This will work for the two ends of the gazebo.

For the four sections along the gazebo sides, I decided to make the center door panel of each section of three, movable by hanging them from overhead tracks.

As the work continued, and February got closer, I got more and more stressed out because of how unprepared I was.

Yet, I kept on busily cutting rails and styles and dismantling pallets to build door panels.

Even though things were coming together, I still was concerned about other issues for their visit.

I went to Hilo for more blankets and sheets. I also picked up some tracks and hangers for the doors to slide on. I cleaned and washed two ice chests, and decided that for the four days they were here, we would live out of them and I would get ice every day if necessary.

Another issue was that there was no toilet at Ahi.

So I built one.

Using pallets as a floor and walls, I built an outhouse with a composting toilet.

Basically a shelf with a toilet seat over a bucket. Good thing I had made all that sawdust cutting the frames for the door panels.

Slowly, the time came. And they were here!

TTFN