7/24-26/07 I went up to the property for 3 days: Tuesday through Thursday.

Kevin, Curtis, and Alex followed me up in their car so they could visit the cabin. We stopped at a sportscar place, a gas station, and at Deception Falls on the way up. We had lunch at Deception Falls. We arrived at the property at about 1:30.

I was happy to discover no mice in the traps and the peanuts were still there. Even so, I think there is a hole somewhere so I told the boys I would pay them if they found any mouse holes. They started looking right away. They found a pipe where the screen was missing and they found a hole in a screen where the mice could get into the space between the rafters over the gable. That wouldn't give the mice access to the interior of the building, but I was glad to know about the hole anyway.

After looking over the building, we decided to hike up to the spring to have a look at it. On the way, Alex stepped on a big bee nest on the ground next to the trail. The bees swarmed out and attacked him. He ran past me hollering and brushing the bees off and in the process, he threw his glasses off. The bees had gotten between the lenses and his eyes. I got stung once on my hand but poor Alex got stung six or seven times mostly on his face.

We all went back to the trailer and treated Alex the best we could with what we had. I went back up into the woods to try to find his glasses. After looking unsuccessfully for a while, I went back to the trailer to get some more protection against the bees and mosquitoes. I put on a raincoat and a net bee hat. I also put rubber bands around my pants legs so the bugs couldn't get up my pants that way. I went back out into the woods and after quite a long search, I found the glasses in a hole under some leaves.

When I got back to the trailer, I paid the boys for finding the mouse holes. Then I showed Kevin and the boys the makeshift chess set that Andrew and I had put together. Kevin and Curtis set it up and immediately started playing chess. Alex was feeling pretty good by then so he and I went out to do some work.

I used a long chain to skid the two half-log planks down from the drainfield area to the cabin. Then I rigged up a come-along and a rope and Alex helped me lift one of the planks up onto the deck beams.

About that time, the visitors decided to leave for home. When they were gone, I patched the newly discovered mouse holes.

On Wednesday morning when I went outside to throw an apple core on the compost pile, I saw a deer standing on the roadway. We watched each other for a few seconds and then the deer turned and ran away. That is the first deer I have seen up there for quite a while. It was good to see him/her.

I was pleased, but not too surprised, to find no evidence of mice in the cabin. I went to work aligning, leveling, scribing, notching, and placing the third deck plank. The scribing method of using a double-ended pencil as a scribe and keeping it plumb by eyeball works really well and really quickly. When I rolled the notched plank over, it thunked into place on the very first try and fit perfectly. I was gratified.

After lunch and a nap, I lifted the fourth plank up onto the beams and aligned and leveled it in preparation for scribing. Just about then, Larry showed up and he watched me demonstrate my leveling and scribing techniques.

I had just recently stumbled on an easy way to dog the log for scribing, that is, to temporarily hold the log rigidly in position after it has been aligned and leveled. For scribing wall logs, the old timers used log dogs to temporarily hold the log in place. A log dog is a bar a couple feet long with a sharpened point sticking out perpendicular at each end. One of these points is driven into the log to be held and the other point is driven into a stationary wall log. That method is too heavy-duty for my planks, and anyway, I don't have any log dogs.

Since the planks are half-logs, they naturally tend to level themselves perpendicular to the log axis just by gravity. It doesn't take much extra to force the log to rotate a little in one direction or the other and to hold it fast. I used to use small wedges of wood jammed between the beam and the half-log. It was hard, though, to keep the wedges from slipping and falling away.

My new technique is to use a short chain instead of wooden wedges. The chain drapes over the beam, then under the half-log on one side, and finally back over the beam on the other side with both slack ends of the chain hanging down on the same side of the beam. The weight of the slack ends keeps tension on the chain and keeps it snugly against the joint between the logs. Fine adjustments to the level of the log can be made by tugging on one end of the chain and rapping on the other side of the log to rotate it a little. It's quick and easy to make these adjustments and the chain keeps the log firmly in place automatically.

Anyway, Larry watched me do this and he watched me use the double ended pencil to make the four scribe marks. Then I showed him how I make a flat rectangular mating surface on each member by choosing a pair of corresponding points with the scribe, one on each member. Then using a level and the scribe, I mark the remaining six points on the two logs. And, finally, I draw the four horizontal lines that mark the depth to which each notch is to be cut.

After all the marking was done, Larry watched me cut one notch with the chainsaw. He was satisfied with watching that much and he decided to leave. He gave me an update on Roberta's condition before he left.

After he left, I finished cutting the other three notches and flipped the plank over to test the fit. This time it didn't fit perfectly, but after working over the surfaces a few rounds with Rasputin, the plank fit nicely, or at least well enough.

Then I flipped both new planks upside down and onto the first two planks and stained the undersides of the planks and the notches in the beams. After washing out my brush, I flipped both new planks back into their notches in the beams for the last time. I was very happy with how the deck turned out and how it looks.

On Thursday morning, there were no signs of mice in the cabin. I measured to see how long the pins needed to be to fasten the deck planks to the beams. I planned to make them out of 3/8" rebar. They turned out to be 6 1/2 inches. I had only enough 3/8" rebar to make five pins. Using the rebar cutter Dr. Dick had given me I made the pins in no time. Then I drilled the pilot holes with a 3/8" augur and drove in the five pins.

I put two pins in each joint and I spaced them as wide as I could and still be strong because I want to get the maximum diaphragm strength from the deck. The planks do not touch each other so there is no shear strength between successive planks. The diaphragm strength will provide the principal counteracting force to the moment on the lower column caused by the staircase load. After talking with Brent Compton I decided that the structure would be strong enough without compression cross bracing members bearing on the column. But I still want the max strength in the deck so I will use four widely-spaced pins in each plank.

Before I left for home, I made some measurements of the as-built deck so I can design the staircase, and I built a makeshift rock staircase so I can walk up and onto the back deck. I fed a flock of gray jays all morning as I worked. I left for home at 1:30.