Walls & Columns

My hole in the ground is rapidy filling up, with the structure slowly emerging above the dirt piles in places, one row of blocks at a time. The expenses continue as well; I thought I might have one day's 5000 peso allowance to spend but with 2000 to Liz for her last two short-term loans, 2200 to Alejandro for the water contract (and more to follow), dinner at Mango's last night (very good cheeseburger, best so far this trip), and a tank of Pemex Magna Sin this morning I'm back to broke, with today and tomorrow's withdrawals already committed to Lencho on Saturday. My replacement Oregon bank card is now in FedEx's hands so maybe the cash flow problem will ease (in that I can double the flow!) next week.

Tuesday afternoon we stopped by the site and noticed that one wall of the cistern chamber seemed not to be in the right place, and further investigation yesterday revealed that the column defining the inboard corner of the cistern was 23 cm (11 inches) too far south. Of course the footing for that wall was also placed 'wrong', but none of it is a big problem (my cistern will hold a bit less) except that misplaced column also defined the outside corner of the closet on the 1st floor. Calls to Lencho and Derek ensued, and the solution will be to end that column at the 1st floor slab, and start another in the right place 23 cm further along that beam. Problem solved.

Today, as the photo shows, the crew is still laying block and also building forms around some of the columns (castillos) to start pouring that concrete today. It appears they will probably start framing the beams (cadenas) shortly too. I probably need to get with Lencho and Derek (the Tompkins return from Oaxaca tomorrow night) to figure out where we are with obtaining a plumber or electrician, and if we should make any provisions for pipes or wire routes before the castillos and cadenas are all set in concrete.

We have been enjoying our time too, with Liz working on a new large curtain with different (quite simple) technology, reading, running for me most days, and daily afternoon beach time as well. Yesterday was our first visit this year to Carizalillo, her favorite swimming spot, and the day before we took Dan over to Playa Coral, the best snorkeling spot in town. We are also going through the books we brought, already wishing we had more or better selections. I just read a silly thriller sort of thing, a cross between "Indiana Jones" and "Da Vinchi Code", written in 1980. That doesn't seem that long ago, but I was constantly thinking "Use your cell phone, stupid!" or "Just look it up on Google!" Times change.