Minimum Viable Cabin

The roof is being installed! Look at all that glorious winter sunlight on that south-facing beauty. Obviously I'm hinting at solar panels, but first let's talk about roofs. There are a lot of options, but the conversation usually boils down to: asphalt or metal, and what color? Pros and cons of asphalt versus metal can be found on all the roofers websites, and they're all pretty much true so I'm not going to repeat them here. I chose metal because of several benefits: Environmental friendliness: metal roofing is 100% recyclable, and is made from very high recycled content. Not only that, it lasts 2 or 3 times as long as an asphalt roof so the waste of production is reduced. Asphalt roofing goes to a landfill - very little of it can be recycled. Even if parts of the metal roof need to be replaced, the old stuff will get recycled. Money : We've discussed my innate cheapness before, such as when I wanted to manage construction myself , or live in a camper instead of

 

The Minimum Viable Cabin is looking good. Not viable technically (certificate of occupancy usually requires you to have y'know... plumbing, heat, roofing... But the shell is done. This is the lovely Bensonwood/Unity crew who were here all week putting it together (missing only Andrew, who got things started before handing off to Rob). Professionals with an eye to detail and obvious pride in what they build, these guys are just fun to work with.

  I have a special rock I stand behind to take photos, so you can have a progressive idea of how the house is going up. 

Please listen to this while you read this entry... So, after I arrived, the guys started arriving with trucks fulla flat-pack stuff (roof, floor, walls, all the good stuff you need to build a house). Christmastime for Dani! The packages started to be unloaded by Greg, using the lull (big ole hopped up forklift). And everything was going fine until... The walls. The big 24' walls. And there were trees in the way. They wiggled around for twenty minutes just trying to get past the trees. There was this one particular beech tree. This lil guy. And beeches are slow growers - this one is probably 30 years old! So when they asked for a chainsaw, I said - aww, come on, I bet you can get past it. Can you just try one more time to see if you can get around it? And being the good sports they are, the guys said sure, we'll give it one more try. AND THEN... Here - let me just zoom out on that photo.... Yes, the lull is in a ditch. Sunk its front tire 4' into a mud pit that appeared out

6 am. Not even joking, not messing with you. That is the time I woke up. I wanted to get to the site in time to meet the crew. I walked there in my extremely reflective Proviz jacket (it's cool as hell, makes you basically  glow  in the dark. And my version is reversible! So I have a wicked bright yellow jacket for when construction starts. But I got here waaaay before those guys and got to walk around in the snow for an hour, trying to picture what the cabin will look like.