Grand and Glorious Curmudgeon

Things are still rattling along in my move to WY.  

The game is afoot! On many levels.  Things I have in the air are:

1. Jon came out for a week in Mid June.  With his help, suggestions, and guidance I am now outfitted with tools & equip to get started as a landowner. Also discovered the neighbor across the road is a contractor who is currently underemployed.

2. Initial work on Casa Kling is underway. Although I am in Portland for the next couple of weeks, work should be underway to level a plot of land, reset the containers, erect a roof over them and park the 5th wheel trailer under shelter.

3. Work is rapidly underway to get the condo in Portland ready to sell.  The expected 2-3 weeks of prep work has been compressed to 2 days before work starts on repairing walls, getting ready to paint, and so forth for a 34K extravaganza that should be done in 14-21 days. The condo should be on the market by end of August.

3. 1-800-GOT-Junk folks are coming back for a reprise (they cleaned out the garage) to haul out everything that I don’t keep.  All the artwork and a bunch of stuff I’m keeping is going into a storage unit in Beaverton while I sort through and make a couple of trips back and forth.

4. I will try to update this later in the week after the condo work is underway.

 I got a call this morning from a nice lady at the State Engineer’s Office. She was inputting my well application into the computer and I apparently had not filled in a blank on the second page that indicated that the person who wanted to put in the well was myself, the landowner.

In my experience, when something like this happened, the clerk entering the information would reject the form and a week or two later, if I was lucky, I would receive the rejected form in the mail, which may or may not have indicated what the problem was.

In this case she called me up, got the information, entered it in the computer, and remarked that the engineers who reviewed the applications would probably get it reviewed within a week or two,  In other words she took action to resolve the problem and reassured me that the application was progressing.  

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 It’s now late Monday evening and there has been some rumbling and distant lightning strikes and a gentle rain is falling. It has happened a couple of times and it strikes me that this might be a recurring pattern. I would presume we get some significant solar heating during the day with some strong thermal uplifts, but with the overall low humidity it would take a while to build thunderheads, and therefore the lightning and thunder and rain at night (rather than at 2pm like in Hawaii, Florida, etc). 

It was reminded of my high school play, “Camelot”, when Arthur is selling the whole deal to Guinevere by talking up the weather (and the title of the piece; at 1:31).

 I met with the Planning Dept and the Building Dept of Natrona County yesterday and things are starting to take shape.  Thus far, I have had the property surveyed and the percolation test of the lot done. So far I see the following tasks as needing to be done:

1. Close on the property. Until it is properly mine I don’t want to sink a lot of time/money into it. Immediately after closure submit permit to county to use the two Conex boxes as storage units. (Previous owner did not do so and that is required)

2. Apply to the Wyoming State Engineer for APPLICATION FOR PERMIT TO APPROPRIATE GROUND WATER to drill a well and use up to 25gallons per minute for Domestic Use. I think the proper land description is NE¼ of the NE¼ of Section 33, Township 34 North, Range 78 West, 6th Principal Meridian of Natrona Wyoming.

3. Get the well drilled. A neighbor warned me that I’ll probably need to drill down 400′ go get good water (at $34. per foot).  Once the well head is in, I will build a 8×12 foot shed to insulate the well and provide space for eventual solar power installation, and run power to it.

4. Once the well head location is determined, install a septic tank and leach field (greater than 100 ft from the well head).  While that is progressing, I can layout and pour/get poured, the concrete pad for the trailer. I want to build a shed roof over the trailer to reduce heat gain in the summer and provide rainwater catchment. Finally move the trailer on the pad and hook up power, water, and septic system. Once that is done I can get an Occupancy Permit and get address assigned and move in as desired. 

5. I would like to get this done, but time really isn’t critical. I have an apartment lease through the end of the year so I can take my time. 

In other news I have decided to sell my condo in Portland. I am planning to go back in late July to babysit cats while the girls go camping and I may bring Charlotte back for a working vacation.  I will bring back any thing that I am wanting to keep (actually not that much) and have been talking to Jen & Kate about managing the disposal of most of the interior for a reasonable cut of my profits. 

I figure I will still visit the girls once a quarter or so, but for a fraction of what the condo is costing me I can stay in a really nice Residence Inn by Marriott.  This will also free up considerable funds for further development of the Wyoming property.