File Under: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

A recent “simple” project that unintentionally became more complex and costly than originally planned.

Christopher on left; Philip on right

Christopher and I set out to remove pungy (aged soft wood no longer holds paint properly) stops from the bottom of several windows.  

Christopher on left; Philip on right

By the time we finished, five of six windows were cracked — just the tiniest bit of excess pressure on the glass and: CRACK.  

The windows are still water tight, but the vacuum seals are destroyed, meaning the windows will fog up in cold weather.

Installing wood filler

So now, instead of just replacing bottom stops to improve the existing windows, we are replacing glass in five windows and all of the stops — getting the stops out to insert the new glass installed often results in cracked and broken stops.

Patricia’s office windows after extensive scraping, wood filling, sanding

New oak stops, primed and awaiting installation

Windows restored and awaiting new glass

- Philip

Hiking

Today Patricia and I joined a group of photographers to hike in Bandelier National Monument, specifically in Frijoles Canyon.  The outing was organized by David Halpern, a photographer who’s been establishing the Artist-in-Residence program there for the past year.  The last time Patricia and I spent real time in the canyon was in 2011 shortly before the devastating Las Conchas fire.  Thus, we could see the change and tremendous damage caused by the flooding that followed the forest fire. 

The walls of the canyon were formed by volcanic eruptions over a million years ago; most of the pueblo structures date to two eras stretching from 1150 to 1600.  To learn more about Bandolier, just Google it.  It’s a very special place; if you ever have the opportunity to visit Bandolier, don’t pass it up.

The group.  Note the several rows of holes in the walls — they held logs which supported the structures at the base of the canyon wall.  These structures faced the river that flows through the Canyon; a couple of miles downstream it joins the Rio Grande.

    This photographer recently had a single woman show of her photographs in Switzerland

     Gives one an idea of the force of the flood waters that ravaged the floor of the canyon

     One of several ladders one climbs to reach the Alcove, carved into the canyon wall.  

                                                      Patricia on one of the ladders.

If you look closely you’ll see one more of the ladders (it’s in a vertical position, center of the image, about 1/3 down from the top).  The Alcove itself is in the shade above and to the right of the ladder.

                  Two more huge wood dams caused by the flood.