HackHaven Estates, The Beginning
     Dreamed Completion Date: September 2002
     Revised Completion Estimate: Early August 2002
     After Milguard Hell: Early December 2002?
     Finally Done: March 2003?

All I wanted was a small shack away from technology -- Unabomber
  • 06/2003: Living there
    More than we'll ever remember has happened in the past six months. We moved in and moved out of Eagle Point and are slowly getting things in order. The garage still has boxes of stuff we probably should just throw out but hidden in there is a CD writer I want and some six gig hard drives and who knows what else. Its not junk, but its far from treasure. So we're migrating onto the new property. Projects that used to be small and easy are now huge and daunting. Adding Kyle to the mix also removed a lot of free time. We at least enjoy the place a lot and the view is so welcome.
    Rather than try to come up with a list of pictures from each category of house, Logan, Kyle, and others which isn't happening, I'm doing a set of pictures which I thought were cute or representative of our lives at the moment. Some are a little old but soem aren't. Enjoy them and I'll try to get something up sooner than another six months.
  • 11/2002: Stained outside, Drywalled inside
    A lot of highly visible stuff happened, although not nearly as quick as we hoped. The move-in date is now Decemberish. The outside went from scaffolding and white to clean looking stained wood. The inside went from just boards to insulation then to dry-walled then to the textured. The change in appearance is huge. The tile bozo said he was wrong about his first date and that he couldn't start until early December so that pushes the whole thing back a few days. The texturing was done just a few days ago so finally, I am up to date.

  • 10/2002: Cleanup for Sheetrocking. Siding demo
    The cleanup for the sheetrocking happened. The fire missed us entirely but there's a picture of the land behind us where the fire did hit. You can also find pictures of the siding which has since been entirely done. We also got garage doors with openers.

  • 09/18/2002: The Fire Nearby
    A fire broke out near our house. You might want to bring up another window (right-click, open in new window) on this tolerable map o this worse map and follow along. The fire broke out near I-80 and Sierra College Blvd and burned along Barton road and burned a good chunk of the area that is between Laird and Barton. I drove in via Dick Cook road since the normal way in was closed to traffic. You can see from the pictures there was a lot of smoke, visible even 10 miles off. So far, three houses have been burned but none were right near us. The land is vacant between Barton and Laird and mostly natural dry land.

    The air tankers did runs along the wind direction and would turn right above our house to head in for the next run. It was quite a site to see the two spotter planes, two air tankers, three helicopters, and news helicopters all flying around.

    I heard about it at 4pm from Leigh Anne who saw it on the news. I checked some local news and found this article and one of the pictures is of a water tower I recognize as being at Rocklin Road and Barton which is less than a mile from the house. I drove out there and as I got closer, the smoke got more and more visible. The road I normally take was closed to all traffic including residents so I got an alternate course from Leigh Anne and got into the house. The water to the house (city water) is done so I had the hose we used to use free. 100 feet of nice vinyl hose did the job and I could wet down behind the house where the fire would come if it felt like it. I never saw flames but I saw a lot of smoke. The 25 mph winds carried the fire south which kept it away from the house.

    Eventually it got dark and the smoke moved away so I went to my softball game. No new news on danger has been heard so I'm hoping it gets left alone. The wind died down as it got dark. To complete this multimedia presentation and get full credit, I'm required to provide you with music and lyrics. Do I pass?

  • 08/2002: Trenches + Power + Pre-fire fires
    The dual trenches emerge. PGE says they'll bless us with power if we dig a second trench for the water. They are scum and have rules they don't apply evenly so its hard to deal with them as, much like the IRS, each person gives you a different correct answer for the next person to contradict. At this stage, we are about to get power but we have to move the water to the other trench.
    Since Fire is the up and coming theme, I'll show you the creative plumber work where they burned the wood and the neighbor got a new gate and the welders who put it in started a small grass fire for us which was put out via some mexican jumping hat dance as the fire department stopped by.
    Check out the crazy roof brace. We have a 20 foot long wood beam resting on a collection of random wood chunks gathered from scrap. At least the windows are finally in but the fit and finish aren't what they were supposed to be so the framers came out and did some more work to make the windows fit. They were at least only a few inches off.

  • 07/21/2002: Alarm + Network Wiring
    The alarm system goes in using brightly colored wires including wires which the phone guy says "aren't acceptable". The CAT5 for networking goes in. It creates comments from everybody because of the amount of wiring I have done. The wiring terminates in an upstairs bedroom where people have quite a bit to say about the bundle of wire. The electrician asks how many OnQue hubs it will take. I tell him we aren't doing that lame thing and instead are using real networking gear.
    The workers leave us food items. The tub with water in it starts to grow its own food items. The welder of the pipes tries to bake inside the house.
    Enjoy the whole house fan picture. Best guess is it was stolen. No news yet on it.

  • 07/15/2002: Wiring/Vacuum Begin
    Good progress was made inside this period. The siding is almost entirely up, the front door is hung, and the interior vacuum system and electrical wiring took leaps forward. We had an outside vacuum jack put in for cleaning out the car. The roof is nearly complete although they wait a long time before finishing it all the way. The tiles are so easily broken.
    The workmen did a funky pole to brace the roof during construction. Its really, really tall and at the bottom is braced and shimmed in a way that makes you wonder if it will hold.
    The port-o-john truck driver who empties it accidentally hit the fence post that holds the gate up. He reported it as "slightly damaged and needing a little fixing" but you can see it got a pretty hard whack. The metal pole is probably done for and we'll have to rip it out and put in a new one. Its too small of job to get a quote on during fencing season so it remains smashed.

  • 07/2/2002: Windows Begin
    Siding is going on and the roof tiles are being laid. If you look at the first pictures, you'll see the missing three windows which finally are installed now that its late August. We found a junk drawer label for those who admit up front to keeping junk. The pasture turned to star thistle entirely because its summer and we don't have water on it.
    The annoying part about not having windows has become that the Pigeons have free access to the house and have roosted in a future air vent. They cover the floor with droppings. A shotgun might hit something valuable so killing them is hard and they're so high up that catching them is not easy.
    The tubs are undergoing leak tests so muck and scum grow in them. Always a delight.

  • 06/2002: Windows Begin
    The plywood goes up on almost all of the house to cover the framing. Next, the windows go in. You'd think, "Wow, its starting to look like a house", but you'd be oh so wrong. Milguard who makes windows hired a new factory in Texas and started making Windows like Microsoft makes software... badly. We have Windows 1.0 and Windows 2.0 and I think it was finally Windows 6.0 that worked. We have an extra set of windows just in case we want to build a Winchester House of Mystery. The sizes of them are off but hey, maybe its my calling.
    On odd but not that exciting, a truck backed off the driveway into the trench and a worker in frustration, probably at the windows, threw a 2x4 through the top of the garage roof where the hole remains under the roofing today.

  • 05/22/2002: Rain Finishes
    The rain ends, filling our lives with the richness of fresh rainwater. The rain was constant although the flash flood type did not fall. It filled our house with water but then it dried out and got swept out and returned to normal. Not much besides wetting and drying happened here but we're told the expansion and contraction of the wood helps prevent problems in the future.

  • 05/10/2002: Rain
    The rain begins, falling on our house like a tragedy. We're watching TV and on comes a "Flash flood alert for Loomis" which shows an amazing amount of rain, perhaps 1.5 inches, is falling in the past hour on Loomis and I think they said "God save those doing construction". This turns out to be the first of two storms that smack our little house. Not much changed from the last set but you can see water, turkeys, and some tarpaper up on the roof in rolls.

  • 04/27/2002: Framing Nears End
    The house framing is finishing up and the plywood is doing on the sides now. The roof ladder is in place to drag stuff up onto the roof. The pasture is pretty, probably its peak greenness of the year, at least until we water. A new camera is now used so the large picture sizes got larger. If you need to, go upgrade your internet connection.

  • 04/22/2002: House Half Roof
    The house roofing begins to shape up. This also marks the slowdown of the visible progress for the next month. The roof work is mostly getting the big boards up and in place then a quick covering with plywood.
    The change is small but at least the number of pictures is small so you don't have to look through fifty variations of "new roof begins"

  • 04/17/2002: Garage Roof
    The garage roof is on, and the house roof is started. The garage looks much bigger now that it has been roofed. The words "vacant cavern" come to mind.
    In addition to the deer, wild turkeys and snakes, we saw a coyote running across the field, but he blends in so well the only picture I got doesn't show him well enough. The cats are concerned. We are working on preventing them from becoming Purina Coyote Chow.
    Leigh Anne seems to have moved into Lowe's, where she researches doors, fixtures, etc. Lowe's seems to have lower prices than Home Depot by 10 to 20 percent. Leigh Anne intends to exchange Christmas cards with the light fixture guy and is contemplating forwarding her mail to the store to save the inconvenience of commuting home every couple of days.
    Leigh Anne got nine free poplar trees from Sierra College. We hope to plant them and create a forest that the county will later prevent us from chopping down.

  • 04/11/2002: Before Roof
    Construction is moving fast. We are about to put the roof onto the garage and the house. We are ahead of schedule substantially and everything seems to be compressed now. We have to pick out lights, roof, tile, and everything because its coming together fast.
    PGE is lame and says we have to dig another trench because the guy who said we needed just one is no longer working there so we need two.
    We don't have water or electricity yet but its coming soon. We found two snakes which might or might not be rattlesnakes. We saw one and think it isn't.

  • 04/03/2002: The Second Floor Walls
    The walls are up and the floor is down and you can walk around on the second floor. The view has yet to show us mountains but it is still very nice to look out.
    Logan got featured in this set. He carries his red hammer everywhere he goes and at the house, he just fit in well with the work to be done.

  • 03/30/2002: The First Floor Walls
    The walls of the first floor are going up fast. While we've been busy looking at tile samples and thinking of carpet choices, the workmen are beating the walls into shape and digging the huge trench. We haven't had much time to go out there but hear in the past few days the second floor has already begun. The pace is fast now. In the trench we have our own pullstring on a two inch pipe to run cable, telephone, fiber, or whatever they deliver to the street. What a treat after watching Comcast lay cable to my house 4 inches under ground by prying the dirt apart with a shovel and pushing the wire in.
    Water now runs to the house and power soon will. Estimates are we might beat the September date but we haven't sold the current house yet.

  • 03/21/2002: The Subfloor rises
    The house is really taking shape. What you see is not even the first floor but the wood that will hold up the floor. The pads been cut, the foundation is down, and the first floor is framed. They managed to sink the great room floor correctly, without sinking everything else. According to the framers, who stood on ladders on the first floor, we will have a view of the snow capped Sierras from the second floor, instead of just the foothills. The neighbor moved the fenced onto the correct boundary line, and we've marked out the place for the barn.
    At the moment, we are the proud owners of a 95 gallon tub with 10 jets. We are using it as a planter till they can install it. Our conversations now consist of discussions of the wonders of one- piece vs two-piece toilets, the relative abilities of chrome and brushed nickel to avert water spotting, what color is "biscuit" exactly, and does one really need a shower with so many heads that it looks like a carwash to be happy?

  • 02/27/2002: The Foundation is set in stone
    To our amazement, we finally see some building happening. Wood forms are laid to pour concrete in. The house hunting is over! We have the starting signs something will happen here. The real-estate process was making us understand why they used to just storm the castle. If you can make it past the drawbridge, you're home.

  • 01/22/2002: Scraping off the nasty Star Thistle
    We got a really big Tonka Toy to scrape the weeds off since the workmen refuse to work in star thistle. The thing is so big it takes one person to deliver it, one to drive it, and other to drive the normal size tractors that level the results of the big one. Somebody told us that "you can level all the trees you want to put in the house" but we wanted the opposite. We had to kill two helpless trees and that was all so that's all we did. The rest get to live with us and be happy trees.
    Where we live now, the dirt is clay or hardpan. It is so hard that pushing a shovel into the soil is a difficult job and can be impossible at times. The new soil is so wonderful that you can dig in it easily. Its more of the fertile Sacramento Valley type soil than Antelope has.
    The house site was a surprisingly level spot on an otherwise steep slope. The house rises approximately eight feet from one side to the other. By putting the house here instead of the horse pasture, the horses get more room thus we can charge them higher rent.

  • January 2002: In the beginning, there was dirt and weeds and really cute trees
    At this stage you see the beauty of the weeds. The land is covered with a rich mixture of Star Thistle and some kind of weed that covers clothing with nasty sharp burrs. Sadly we hope to remove this natural beauty leaving the trees and shrubs only.
    The goal of the project is to have a house, a horse pasture, trees, and a pond all on the same lot. We're allowed 4.6 cows and/or horses. We might try to cross-breed them to see what new creature we can have. We're allowed two cats and/or dogs which really confuses us but when you see the name Bob Meyer (The Tick) as a realtor, you know the contracts are going to be confusing and written by people with very little legal skills.




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