Cemented

I have played with a lot of cement. You usually can't put roughly 900 bricks in place without it.

But for the first time ever, today I played with cement that came in a truck. A big truck. This truck. (Oh and that's Lawrence walking into the scene!)

And we got our 12x18 foundation poured. It was a horrid experience. Uber messy. Physically demanding. A job you CAN'T take a break from. And you have to move, fast, fast, fast!

I don't think the concrete had enough water in it because it started to set up even before we had all of it off the truck. It was unseasonably cool here today. Had it been in the 90s or above 100 like it's been for the last week or two, we'd have been seriously screwed.

As it was, we managed to get it done. It's not pretty (I neither expected nor need it to be) but it appears to be solid and level. I'm going to cover it with bricks soon so I wasn't concerned with having a perfect surface. What's unfortunate is that I have a moat of concrete in the backyard. It came from all of the excess we scraped off during screeding. I couldn't stop to level it out and it dried in place before I could. It will require a sledge or pickax to bust it up and get it low enough to just throw rock back over or to place pavers on. I bought 3.5 yards of concrete, mostly as a precaution because we had to fill the five holes we created to place the post. Seems 3, or more likely 3.25, would have been better. Live and learn.

So, I spent a few hours ankle-deep in cement. I was at it so long and the concrete was setting up so fast that at one point, I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to get out of it! It would be ironic to be an ornament, forever stuck on my own patio! But who knows? Perhaps I've created the next fashion craze: Mafia shoes!