My oh my. It was a really hot day right out of the gate this morning when I got up at seven. For me getting up at seven is rare. I knew that our favorite carpenter would be here right at eight. Dennis left for the St. James Railroad Days events shortly at eight. Main Street hosts the car show and Dennis had his 1965 Ford Galaxy ready.
I have been around Jim Bob, our carpenter, several times when he has done work for us. I know what to help with and when to get scarce. We had our lumberyard deliver green treated supplies and the object was to put the sub-floor down on top of the porch concrete floor. There comes a time when the older ones on Stauffer have to give up the battle and do a fix. With seepage onto the floor when the patio has more rain water that it knows what to do with, it does find ways to creep in. The bare concrete floor takes only several hours to dry off. We have found it is quite nice to put a carpet down. Oh yes, the comforts of home. Megan and Nicholas have appreciated the carpeted floor as well as they get out various games and toys to spread out on.
We are now ready for the next phase and that is picking out just the right color of carpet that is tagged as “Indoor-Outdoor.”
Five hours from start to finish and the project is completed. I cleaned up scraps of wood and carried it right over to neighbor Bob’s burning pit. One day Dennis and I are going to have to help clean out ashes. By the time I had the last of the saw dust vacuumed up, Jim Bob had his tools in his pickup. We talked about several options for venting and decided on holes on the east and west as that is how the 2 x 4 stringers run. The carpets will not be so dense as to work against this plan. Some of our chairs have fairly small caster rollers and it wouldn’t take much for a roller to find a hole if there were holes other than at the sides. Time will tell if more holes will be needed.
Jim Bob and I had some cold water on the east patio after the job was finished. It is 90 degrees plus, but a brisk wind did help cool us off. Jim Bob was telling me his take on big box stores and what they sell. As an example, Menards may sell products with the Kohler name, but the specifications of the product may be adjusted to warrant Menards selling it for a reduced price. I had never taken notice, but Jim Bod said 
that somewhere on the product label, be it Lowes, Menards or Home Depot, there may be a “M”, “L”, etc to testify to the fact that that product meets their individual specs. It is much like what an outlet mall may sell. It is always nice to hear the skinny from people who make building supplies their specialty.
Dennis is now home from the car show and he is willing to call it a day. I can only imagine how hot it was sitting in what little shade could be found. There were 50 cars that participated. Now we need to stay tuned to the weather channel. The last report was that there is a storm about 60 miles to the southwest of us and we may be included. Bummer.
