Yes, that’s right – waiting. Just after the lot was staked out, we contacted the engineer and he said he would check to see when his schedule would allow an on-site visit. Bruce helped and said perhaps that would not be necessary if we took lots of pictures and measured the angle of the slope. With a little geometry help from friend Jim Jamison (even though it probably hurt his head to brush up on 10th grade math almost as much as it hurt ours) we determined the degree of slope and sent off the photos to Jon, the engineer. And waited for a response.
During our wait, smoke from the Wallow Fire in Arizona got a bit out of control in Catron County, and we are over 80 miles away from the actual flames. Imagine what folks closer had to deal with! The smoke came and went for the first 2 weeks of the fire, then it settled in for several days in a row, during which we would wake up in the middle of the night choking. Looking at a map of New Mexico, we determined it would be quite a long drive (several hours) to escape the smoke. How in the world do the firefighters do it? Those guys are truly heroes. A little crazy, but heroic all the same.
After a week or so, we received word from Bruce, who had spoken with Jon, about a plan for a retaining wall built right into the back wall of the garage. Brilliant! And not too much additional cost. But wait… there’s a slope in front too. What about that one? At present, Jon is reviewing our eastern slope to let us know if we need an extra-special plan to avoid the house sliding away down the hill from erosion issues.
Other Updates…
- Our 2nd shipment of EF Block has been scheduled for Saturday, July 9th, when another semi will wind its way through the Wildwood Subdivision roads toward Vista Grande, or actually, to Javelina Holler for staging…
- We dropped off a set of plans to a plumber in Magdalena and are awaiting an estimate from him for the house.
- We sent a set of plans to local electrician Josh and are awaiting an estimate from him.
- See, I told you. Waiting.