With a Little Help from My Friends

While the drywall was going in, I had Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall" playing over and over in my head. Something about the walls going up pushed that song to fore.

Hanging was very quick, taking roughly 2-3 days. Also, one of the more entertaining parts of the building took place--stilt walking. For high ceilings, drywall finishers don stilts to do some of the finish work, and in the process, look very whimsical and precarious. That's what this guy was doing in the pictures above. In my haste, I had contracted with this crew with the idea of finishing and priming the walls quickly in the hopes of providing a nice shelter for my parents to stay in/inspect on the 4th of July Weekend. Because of that haste, I forgot about a couple essential amenities:

--Bathroom fans

--Dryer exhaust

Oops. And big "Oops" at that. So with that, I had to go back and take down some pieces of drywall and install these fixtures. I would have been lost and frustrated, but I had "A Little Help from My Friends."

For one, I had my oldest (in length of time that I've known him) friend, Patrick, helping me out. That picture is of Patrick crafting a balloon animal at a bar. Don't ask me why, but there was a pile of balloons with instructions on how to make balloon animals at a bar where we went to see one of my friends play some music. If Patrick doesn't want to stay in construction, he might have a future as a clown.

I've known Patrick since I was a baby, our parents were friends when we were born, so we started to hang out and play G.I. Joes and Ninja Turtles together as kids. We lost touch for awhile in high school and college, but last summer, we reconnected to renovate the house in which I grew up in Illinois. That project still has some finishing touches to be completed, but Patrick was instrumental in advancing and leading that renovation.

Since I needed all the help I could get, I naturally turned to him again to help with this house. Needless to say, he has been instrumental and awesome again. His knowledge of energy efficiency/weatherization, construction, and attention to detail has been a godsend to my scatter-brained approach to building this house. At times, I've been fatigued and stressed, not knowing what to do next--but Patrick has provided the much needed push to keep the project on track.

On one night in particular, I came back to the house after going to a coffee shop to unwind. It was close to midnight, and there was a worklight on in the house. I walked in to find Patrick priming the walls and ceiling with a giant paint roller.

Me: "Dude, what are you doing?"

Patrick: "Painting, what's it look like?"

Me: "It's almost midnight--"

Patrick: "Well, it's better than painting in the middle of the afternoon."

He had a point. I grabbed a roller and started priming. We finished up around 1:30am and I was thankful that Patrick was so dedicated. He gave me the swift kick to the ass that I needed.

In the time that Patrick has been here, Colin had to return to real life back West for awhile and attend a wedding. However, with those pilgrimages completed, he has come back for a few weeks to further accelerate some of the building and finishing.

Wait, I've seen this movie before...This is totally that scene from "Desperado" when El Mariachi's friends come back to town to help him defeat the evil crime baron. I'm trying to figure out who has the rocket launcher guitar case and who has the machine gun guitar case, but I guess that makes me Antonio Banderas. That's not vanity, it's just a logical analogy, I swear.

Here Comes the Sun

This is my favorite part of building the house. I have done solar installation for the last two and a half years, and I'm probably going to make a career in renewable energy. To me, it seems like something which can be embraced by all walks of life. Especially with the harnessing of the sun as a direct energy source, it evokes something which is universal and essential. Indeed, I have embraced such existential delusions of grandeur that I made a Latin phrase from the Satyricon the motto of my company: "Sol Omnibus Lucet"--"The Sun Shines Upon Us All." Yep, I'm a pompous snob :).

So, on to the roof porn:

This is a 3.22 kW (nameplate value) system, comprised of 14 solar panels/modules, each with their own micro-inverter. The micro-inverters are the shiny silver boxes pictured above. More commonplace systems use a single, centralized inverter, but this newer technology makes each panel its own mini-system. In this the way, the system is highly modular, more efficient, safer, and uses fewer components. Additionally, monitoring for the system's performance can be easily monitored both from the system's display or through a wi-fi connection and computer. My parents or I could monitor the system's daily performance via computer, which is pretty neat.

Although we did not do solar water heating on the house, I planned for enough roof space to incorporate solar hot water in the future. One day, this house might run completely off of solar energy, but for now, it is going to have net zero electrical bills.