John van Gurp

The cottage is all tight now. The carpenter’s work is done and I’m on my own now but have offers of help from a few friends, so that’s nice. I found an almost new Franklin fireplace in New Albany. It’s being offered for sale by a guy I knew through PWGSC Headquarters and the Treasury Board many years ago. Back in around 1995 or so I published a web site with surplus federal properties and also made a slide show presentation explaining how useful this could be. Almost no one in the department seemed to clue into it, except for this guy who recognized the potential and made a case. I’m not sure if it had any influence on the approach to online marketing of government real estate, and given the ponderously unimaginative way the organization thinks it probably made no difference at all but I digress….

The inside stairs are done and the patrtition walls are framed. The electrician is doing his thing this week. Heather and I are going down on Friday to scope things out and buy a few bundles of shingles and make up the lumber order for the deck, etc etc…

First thing is to get a small counter space and a sink and enclose a bedroom or two. Oh, and I need to move the outhouse to the new location. It’s just far enough away from the cottage as to be discreet, yet not so far one would panic on the way there. The woodshed will be between the outhouse and the cottage so folks can carry a stick or two on their way back. It leaves open the possibility of saying “I’m going to get some wood” instead of “I’m going to the outhouse”.

We attended a fundraiser for Sierra Leone this week. Very nice, with some moving talk by my friend Thomas Turay. See http://cdpeace.com

Biking continues to be much fun. Half the fun is pushing the skills and getting better on cornering, even after all these years.

Must leave for work now!

(photo credit to jadz)