Stacking and Shovel

Living Off the Grid requires a lot of stacking and shoveling. It is pretty much how I spent most of last week and the weekend. We have come to the conclusion that we will be doing road work every year. In the three years we have lived here we have replaced three culverts, re-crowned and re-graded the entire road, and every year we put down at least one dump truck load of Stay-Mat to fill in washouts. Other years we needed other excavation work done,  so we have just had it spread for us. This year due to the tightening of funds we did it ourselves. Also because we lack the foresight have it deposited in our truck we were handling it twice. We had a dump truck load delivered and then had to shovel it into our truck and then off again onto the road. 

Here is Casey with his broken finger about three quarters of the way through the pile (about five truck loads).

How did he break his finger you ask? Well that is where the stacking comes in.  He crushed it between two rocks fixing our culverts.

The Arrow Points to the Offending Rock

 

 

 

 

 

This one didn't come out that good for obvious reasons. Also that rock is huge. The culverts are 2 foot culverts to give you a sense of scale. Lots of cursing and one emergency room trip later, we were back at it the next day. Albeit much less enthusiastic. We need a tractor.

Speaking of rocks and tractors. I was having a discussion with a girlfriend the other day about engagement rings.  I stated that at this point in my life I would much rather have a tractor than a ring that I will never be able to wear with all the shoveling and stacking. She wants to sell hers and use it as a down payment on a new truck.  I think that makes us official homesteaders now.