Getting my kitchen on...

For people who know me well, you'll more than likely be aware that I love to entertain, mostly with ribald stories, but also with home cooked fare. Also, that I am a strong proponent of gas. Having lived in a couple of share houses back in the day that had electric hobs I made a conscious decision that I would never again reside in a house where electric cooking was the norm. When I bought Arnie Acres I tried hard to ignore the awful electric cooktop that sat forlornly in a darkened corner of my new kitchen. Fat chance, I lasted about eight weeks before ripping out the cooktop and counters to replace the horrid laminex with wood and install some good old fashioned gas hobs.

My good friend and skilled woodwork teacher, Ross helped me build my benchtops from Cypress Pine that had been milled by a friend of his. We then set about biscuit-joining it together and getting our sandpaper on. It took a few sessions to get the desired finish and thickness, but it came together nicely. So, one fine morning we fired up my iron and started to remove the laminex coating. A great use for an iron too, first and only time its been used in my pad... Once that was done we cut out the appropriate holes with a jigsaw, then set about gluing and screwing the new tops on. A few hours later and it was done. A final session with the sander and a couple of coats of varnish and it was done... The plumber came the next day and finished installing the gas hobs and my new kitchen was complete. I couldn't have been happier.

Renovators delight...

Destroying shit is easy, just take a large, heavy implement and go for it. Fixing things, however, is a whole different ball game. Fixing things with the assistance of a tradesman in a country town is even more difficult and a little frustrating to say the least. I really wanted a bath, a big bath. Really, what kind of country abode is complete without a large soaking tub? My second bathroom contained a bath already, but the previous tenants were either 3 foot tall or were using the bath tub to wash their dishes in. If I sat in the tub I couldn't even straighten my legs completely. So, I trashed the spare bathroom. I have to admit, it was pretty good fun. Mostly it involved a hammer and a snatch bar. By the time I was finished, the bathroom was wrecked, proper wrecked.

Clearly a well planned exercise

It was messier than I thought and I was beginning to think that my four week turn around from start to finish may have been a little ambitious. I already knew a plumber from Ararat and was sure that he would help me out with the rebuild, for a cash price in a short time-frame. So, long story short, I was kidding myself. It took about four months for my new bath to be fully operational and required a builder, a plumber, a plasterer, a couple of mates and a fair amount of hard work. The plasterer had to re-plaster the walls and ceiling, the builder installed the frame for the bath, the plumber plumbed and my mates helped out with tiling, grouting and reflooring.

The finished product

In the end, it was a pretty drawn out affair, but it didn't break the bank, I was able to gain some decent experience and the bathroom looks and performs pretty well. And as an added bonus, the bath is massive and is an absolute pleasure to relax in...

Gettin down to business...

It's pretty overwhelming when you move into a new home, especially on your own, 200 kilometers from your comfort zone. What do you do first? Well, you clean of course. Get rid of the smell and detritus from the former residents, then move on and do what you want to do, or indeed have to do.
One side of my house had a pretty decent lean to it. Why would this be? Why would the room be falling away towards the western side? I met my neighbor Gary a couple of days later and he put the mystery to bed. My house had been rebuilt in 1989 on the site of the original Chinese Hospital during the gold rush. Cool history lesson Gary, but if the house is only 22 years old, why are my stumps fucked already? (Use of extra swearing is encouraged in country areas, as it helps to ingratiate yourself with the locals (most of the time)). Ah, that's a good question and can be answered simply. They just built the house on the original stumps that have been there for around 150 years. Ah ha, great...

Don't do it people, pay a professional to suffer on your behalf...

So, on a February afternoon (middle of summer), I decided that I would pull up the deck and start checking out the stumps. That escalated quickly, I mean it really got out of hand, to me lying on my stomach under the deck, armed buried shoulder deep in a hole with a hand trowel. The original stumps were redgum, but when I started to lift the house up, with hydraulic jacks, they just swang in the breeze.
They had rotted completely and needed replacing. Each hole needed to be 600mm deep to accommodate the new concrete stumps, then fitted, attached and then filled with quick set concrete. As a job, re-stumping would have to be up there with the shittest in history. I made friends with some serious arachnoids under there, not to mention the mosquitoes and flies and that was only on the edge of the house. I can't even imagine what happens out there in no-mans land, underneath the living room. Safe to say I won't be doing that again for a very long time. And yes, the rooms are a little more level...

Inception

Hi Folks, So I decided to start a new blog after a few suggestions from some people around me. I have been blogging for some time about climbing, but it has been recommended that I should do some sprouting about some other aspects of my life.
I am a city boy originally, born and bred in Melbourne with no real experience of living on the land, gardening, hunting, cultivating or any of that stuff. I have been rock climbing for over 20years and a desire to do more of this led me to move out of the city and join my country brethren out near the Grampians, a unique and wildly beautiful part of Western Victoria. I spent a year living in Ararat, where I grew my first veggies. What a great idea, I planted a bunch of seeds, did a bunch of watering and weeding and a few months later I had fresh, organic veggies. Awesome. And even better, I now had an excuse to start buying tools.

My first veggies

 I really enjoyed my year in town, I climbed lots and made heaps of new friends and lots of my city peeps came to visit, but if I was going to stay in the country I would need to buy a place of my own. I wanted space, peace and quiet and to create some sort of attachment to the land. Plus, renting is a mugs game out here, where prices are relatively cheap, but rent still pretty high. So, the search began. Ideally, I wanted a hobby farm type arrangement. A max of ten acres with a house, not quite a renovators delight, but not out of house and garden either. Somewhere I could practice using my new tools, grow my own produce and rear some animals. Sustainable and attainable. I quickly lucked on to a 5 acre plot, ten minutes out of town, cool house in need of a few improvements, massive amounts of shed space, a wood burner and some chooks thrown in for good measure. That was about 18 months ago. In coming blogs I will try to share some of the more interesting, challenging and hilarious moments of my time 'on the land.'

Sunrise over Arnie Acres

My new country abode

Finally I had an excuse to drive a ute...

Please follow the site and feel free to comment or post any experiences or questions that you may have. I have managed to do lots of really cool things since moving, but have made some crazy errors as well, which you should feel free to point out too... 
Enjoy...