World Habitat Day

Today is World Habitat Day. Millions of people live in substandard housing, and in particular children are more likely to develop diseases and less likely to graduate from school when they live in poor housing conditions. But this isn't just in developing countries in Africa or Asia, it's here in the United States, too.

There are lots of way to support Habitat for Humanity. Check for your local affiliate to get involved, either by volunteering or donating or both.

Habitat Build-A-Thon 2010

I'll be participating in Habitat for Humanity East Bay's annual Earth Day build-a-thon. It's not just a blitz build to kick start the construction of homes for deserving families, it's also Habitat East Bay's biggest fundraiser. Any amount you can contribute is appreciated! Or if you want to participate, check out the build-a-thon page.

World Habitat Day

Today is World Habitat Day, to remind everyone that adequate shelter is a basic human right. According to the United Nations, more than 100 million people in the world today are homeless. Even here in the U.S., one of the wealthiest nations in the world, millions of people are homeless or living in substandard housing. You can help by donating or volunteering with your local affiliate.

GRID Alternatives

up on the roof

Today I volunteered with GRID Alternatives, a non-profit that installs solar panels for low-income homeowners and provides community members (like me!) with training and hands-on experience with renewable energy technologies. We were prepping some of the Habitat homes for GRID's upcoming solar-a-thon, where they'll install panels, inverters and wiring for 16 homes. It was a short work day because most of the prep work got done last week. We installed a few safety clips on one roof, and others sorted tools and supplies. After a bit, a delivery truck arrived with the solar panels, inverters and cutoffs for the install. We inventoried them to make sure everything was there, then moved them into one of the houses for storage. Pretty much everything is ready to go for the solar-a-thon, which is good, because they're expecting 250+ people for the event.

It's Hot!

No great surprise to those of you in California, but it's hot here. The car said it was 77 at 8:15AM, and 100 at 4:00PM. It was broiling out at the Habitat for Humanity work site, but we got a lot done.

Tomorrow K & I will be going to a local food festival, the Eat Real Festival. Local food and beers, from the people who created them. You can read more about it on my Our Oakland blog. It should be great! And hopefully a little cooler than today.

Meanwhile I'm slowly mudding and taping the dining room and entry. This is me working in the clerestory in the entry way. I love the round windows (a house down the street of a similar vintage has one), but they have been more work. But most of the extra work for the taping and mudding has come from all the corners and edges that define the dining room and entry. Those also swallow a lot of mud during the taping phase, so I've gone through quite a bit for a relatively small surface area. But it's getting done.

One Project Closer's Before and After Contest

One Project Closer is having their second annual Before and After Contest. You send them pictures and a story of your DIY project (at least 75% DIY), and each week they'll pick a winner. At the end, there will be a grand prize winner. The cool part for me is that each winner has $35 donated to Habitat for Humanity in their name. Winners also get $25 gift cards to Lowe's, Home Depot or Amazon, but for me the real winner is spreading the word about Habitat's mission of eliminating poverty housing across the world.

Earth Day Build-a-thon

wall going up

I spent the last four days framing houses at Habitat for Humanity East Bay's Earth Day Build-a-thon. We've had unusually hot temperatures for this time of year (Monday was in the upper 90s) which slowed down progress, but it was a great event, raising over $200,000 and getting a ton of progress done on 20 homes. You can read more about it on the Habitat for Humanity East Bay / Thrivent Builds blog. We also had a little excitement, with a truss delivery crane falling over at the end of the day.

I'd like to give a huge thank-you to those of you who donated money to support my efforts. THANKS!

The Week So Far...

Monday I ran the new supply lines for the kitchen sink. The process re-emphasized my love of the headlamp I bought last year. When sweating copper pipes, you generally feel like you need a third hand anyway, and if you're in a tight space under the house it's doubly so because even if you had a third hand, you'd be in the way of the light when you held it. The headlamp has no such problems.

blob-o-tape

The rest of the week I've been pulling wire for the various kitchen circuits. Mostly an easy task, as it's in the ceiling and walls, but it has required a number of trips under the house for the home runs, too. One unplanned for task was moving a switch for an outlet in the living room over to make room for the kitchen light switch (a 3-way switch outside one door; the other is on the half height wall by the other entrance). Because the existing wires from one side weren't long enough to reach the new location, I decided it was time to start a new circuit. I hadn't planned on doing any work on the living room until the far distant future (e.g., after the kitchen is done and the lengthy list of other tasks is completed), but with the wall open, it's a lot easier now. When I pulled the old switch out of the box, I was afraid I was going to find some dodgy wiring job with things just twisted together like I've read about on other blogs, but they'd actually soldered the splice before smothering it in tape, so it wasn't too bad. But now the living room has its very own 15 amp circuit, though only the newly replaced outlet has a proper ground. That leaves...um...the short hall in the middle of the house as the only thing on the old house-wide circuit? Maybe the closets? With this house, you can never be sure.

Today I was out to Habitat, and for a change I wasn't cutting stair stringers, or even doing anything related to stairs. Instead I was helping inventory the beams for the different house models, making sure each had the correct set in its pile. That meant pulling out a few that were too short and cutting new ones, and pulling out a few that were too long and cutting them down to size. In case you're wondering, 4x12 LVL beams are heavy. We also ran some temporary electrical for the speechifying and such that will go on during the build-a-thon. Finally, we repaired an extension ladder that had been smooshed on one end. It's now in better shape than it's been for a while, though it is about 4' shorter.

Little Blue Boxes

This week I worked on the kitchen, and actually moved forward with things. I finished placing the boxes and fixtures for electrical, which if you've ever looked at the code requirements for a kitchen, are substantial. Two small appliance circuits, dishwasher, disposal, lighting, and a 240v range circuit, and it all adds up. Plus there's the refrigerator, a 120v outlet for a newer gas stove (we don't need it, but it's easier to add now than later), range hood, under cabinet lights, and for good measure, we have a couple of recessed fluorescents above the sink and the adjacent countertop.

I ran the pipes for the vent stack for the kitchen sink. After puzzling over it repeatedly, as I was doing it I figured out how to run it using more of the fittings and pipe I already had on hand. So I returned one riser clamp and $25 worth of fittings, which is always a nice thing. And for good measure, I added a holder bracket for the pipe to the shower in the bathroom that I'd neglected to include back when I redid the shower a couple of years ago.

When I was at Home Depot to return the fittings and pick up a few other things, I was pleasantly surprised at how much better the service has gotten. Maybe they're training them better, maybe they're just afraid of losing their jobs, but whatever the cause, I'm liking the results. It was even quick and painless at the returns desk.

many stringers

I don't have any interesting pictures of the progress on the house to show you (wanna see a bunch of blue boxes nailed to studs?), so I'll include a picture from today's work at Habitat. I once again cut stringers for stairs. That means a lot of very careful identical cuts. "Sloop" John B. is the Americorps member who's been doing this week in and week out in preparation for the upcoming build-a-thon, so once a week isn't so bad. There's a lot to do -- 20 houses * 3 stringers per stair section * 2-3 stories per house adds up.

One Step Forward, Three Steps Back

new framing

That's how this week felt, at least. Thursday evening I was basically back to where I'd been at the end of last week. To be sure, things are in better shape than they were now that the termite-damaged wood has been removed, but it's frustrating as all get-out (frakking frustrating for you BSG fans) to not be any further along than I was a week ago. And I thought I was basically done with framing back in September. I've gone through most of a 5 lb. box of 16p nails since then.

But it wasn't all doom and gloom. Our neighbor, upon hearing of our kitchenless state offered to bring some food over for dinner. She recently returned from working in Europe, and wasn't able to cook while there, so she's happy to cook extra and share with us. And we're happy to have some home-cooked food (though we've been finding some good microwaveable stuff from Trader Joe's, it just ain't the same).

Today I was out to Habitat for Humanity for my usual Friday volunteer gig. I spent the day cutting stringers for stairs for the 20 houses in the upcoming build-a-thon (it's not too late to sign up or donate!), but what was of note were the helicopters. The Edes site is just south of Oakland Coliseum, where the memorial service for the 4 Oakland police officers who died recently was held today. The site is also near the Oakland Airport, so helicopters, small planes and jets aren't unusual, but the sheer number of helicopters in the air quickly caught our attention. I was thinking about the officers, their families, and their friends and co-workers frequently throughout the day.

Tomorrow I'm off to Casa Decrepit in Alameda for their demolition party. It'll be fun to meet some other Bay Area housebloggers, and a nice change of pace from demolishing stuff in our house. This week was more than enough of that for me.

Habitat Build-a-thon

last year's build-a-thon

As if I don't have enough to do (the kitchen cabinets arrive on Wednesday), coming up in April is Habitat for Humanity East Bay's annual Earth Day build-a-thon. This is the biggest build we've done, framing 20 houses in 4 days. I'll be a crew leader this year (not a house leader; I'm nuts, not crazy) so my fund-raising requirements are lower, but I'm still trying to raise $1,000 for the event. You can find my fund-raising page here. If you live in the SF Bay Area, consider taking part in the event yourself.

I owe a lot to Habitat because that's where I learned 99% of my building skills. I volunteer on the work site most Fridays (I didn't yesterday, because I'm busy getting ready for the cabinets and trying to keep the kitchen Rosie-proof), but the build-a-thon is also a fundraiser and a chance to get to see a whole lot of progress in a short amount of time. Most importantly, it's a chance to give people a hand in having a simple, decent place to raise their families. So donate if you can -- every little bit helps!

Hobbing and Nobbing

So the subflooring was worse than I thought. Today I was out to the Habitat for my usual Friday gig, only this wasn't a usual Friday. Habitat East Bay held their 2nd annual Executive Build, where executives from different companies around the Bay Area come out and learn about Habitat and ways to partner with them, and swing a hammer for half a day. So I was hobbing and or nobbing with big cheeses (mmm...cheese) from companies like PG&E (they're paying for the solar panels on all the Habitat houses), Chevron, B of A, Wells Fargo, and more. Well, mostly I was swinging a hammer and teaching some new homeowners who were out getting started on their 500 hours of sweat equity how to swing one, too.

Oh, right. The subfloor. The event was through lunch, though a number of people stayed to work for another couple hours. After I got home, I started in on pulling up the vinyl flooring in the kitchen. I figured it was a good way to unwind, and as I'd only put in 3/4ths of a day at Habitat, I still had some energy. I hauled the dishwasher up to the carport, then pulled up flooring. It's glued to 1/4" plywood, and coming up in 2x2 or so chunks.

find a happy place

I pulled up some by where the sink had been, and saw the telltale of tunnels and castings. Fortunately no live termites, but after that and dropping the dustpan down a hole in the subfloor (yeah, there's a hole that big), I decided it was enough for the day. So let's all look at the lovely sunset instead, shall we? Lalalala...no termite damage here.

Thanks, Millard

Millard Fuller, 1935-2009

Millard Fuller, founder of Habitat for Humanity, passed away today at 74. Over 1.5 million people around the world live in better homes built by Habitat volunteers, because of the organization that he and his wife Linda founded in 1976.

But countless other people, including K and I, live in better homes because of what they've learned volunteering with Habitat. I'd been volunteering with Habitat for 9 years or so when it occurred to me that I might have learned enough to design and build an addition myself. There's a lot of kind and patient people who taught me things to thank, too, but Millard Fuller has to be at the top of the list. Thanks, Millard.

MLK Day of Service

Rather than re-post, I'll refer you to my (fairly new) other blog, Our Oakland, for a brief writeup of my MLK Day of Service activities and some pictures. Yes, they were construction-related :-)

What did you do for the MLK Day of Service? (NV, I know you spent the day nursing a cold, so you're excused.)

Our Oakland

Oakland - many parts, one whole

There's a great post over at City Homestead about Oakland in the aftermath of the shooting of Oscar Grant by a BART police officer. My Oakland is different their Oakland, and was different than Oscar Grant's Oakland, but it's all Our Oakland. It's a large, diverse, beautiful city, and I love it. I'll be the first to admit that I might feel differently if I lived in some other parts of Oakland, but it's a wonderful city.

Yesterday I worked out at Habitat for Humanity, south of the Oakland Coliseum. I've been volunteering in that neighborhood for almost 14 years, but I don't really know it, and the only people I know who live there are Habitat homeowners. But slowly but surely the neighborhood is improving. Besides two large Habitat developments, there are a number of commercial developments along 98th, and just the other side of the BART tracks is a large development of Pulte Homes.

Today K and I went to some other Oaklands. A fawn died under our carport, and animal control warns on their website that living animals come first so it could be a long wait, and I didn't want to dig the requisite 4'-deep hole to bury it. So we carefully slid it into a heavy bag and took it to Oakland's animal shelter. The drive took us from Montclair, through Glenview, to the Dimond District where Oscar Grant worked, down Fruitvale Avenue to the Fruitvale District where he died. There were no signs of the protests there (the vandalism didn't start until they got closer to downtown) -- it was the same Fruitvale I've gotten to know over the last couple of years. Edis and his family live there, and I've made frequent trips to the nearby Home Depot and to Economy Lumber. It was a beautiful day, with food cooking, people shopping, the sun shining.

Union Point Park

After the animal shelter, we went to a small shoreline park to shift gears from our grim task. Union Point Park is a little park along the Oakland estuary near Coast Guard Island, squeezed between the estuary and an industrial area. (I'd been there before because the Alameda County household hazardous waste facility is nearby.) It's home to a playground, picnic area, marina, and a distinctive viewing platform. The viewing platform is all the more interesting viewed from above, when its spiral shape becomes apparent. The park also contains the statue pictured above, Sigame/Follow Me, which reflects the diversity of Oakland by honoring various Oakland women of note. Like Oakland and her people, it's made of many disparate parts, but is one whole. Sometimes we forget that. But it's all Our Oakland.

Best. Tape. Ever.

I won! Before the Christmas break, I won one of the lovely DIY Network tape measures. With the holiday, I didn't have much time to use it until recently.

In short, it's the best tape I've ever owned. Good extension, glides in and out of the housing like silk, and the double-sided numbers are a nice feature. It'll get its real test in April at the 2009 Habitat for Humanity East Bay build-a-thon. (This year's goal is to frame 20 houses in 4 days; I think the most we've done before is 10.) But so far, I'm lovin' it. Thanks to the folks at One Project Closer and at DIY Network for the contest. You can get one of the tapes (without the DIY Network logo) for yourself at Amazon or your local home improvement store.

On the less impressive end of the tool spectrum, I had my second Powershot stapler die. The concept is great -- put the end of the release lever over the staple exit to maximize pressure where it's needed -- and that part works well. But the ruggedness just isn't there. The first stapler died on one of the Mexico mission trips; the roof crew tried to load staples the wrong way and jammed it up. Its replacement died the other day, when the clip that holds the staples in broke. It can still be used with some tape to hold the clip in, but that doesn't work very well in the long term. Even before it broke, it had a tendency to jam, particularly when nearing the end of a clip of staples. The reviews on it at Ace and Amazon indicate I'm not the only one disappointed in its performance.

But Marge!

OK, it wasn't my lifelong dream, and no, it wasn't to eat world's biggest hoagie. But I have long wanted to drive a Bobcat. Alas, given the nature of our lot (a steep slope down from the road before it levels out), I was unlikely to have an excuse reason to rent one.

But today I finally got to drive one, and no rental fee required. I volunteered today at my local Habitat for Humanity. Normally I go out on Fridays, but today we had a Lutheran build day for Thrivent Builds. Well that, and I was busy yesterday finishing up the electrical work in the basement here.

Americorps trying out the playground equipment

The houses in the Edes A development are basically done. Now we're working on the common area between the houses, which will have benches, grills, picnic tables, a couple of oak trees, and a playground area. There was a playground equipment guy assembling the the structure, and half the volunteers were working on the play area, and some cool sandbag + stucco benches.

The rest of us were working on Edes B, filling in trenches where the sewer pipes had been placed for a couple of houses, in preparation for the foundations being poured. Filling in the trenches involved moving a lot of sand and dirt, so we got to use the Bobcat to load the wheelbarrows.

me driving the Bobcat

Another regular volunteer and I took turns using it, and I have to say...it was a blast. They can turn on a dime (though not very smoothly), lift a whole lot of whatever, and have driving controls straight out of Battlezone. Of course, they're noisy, smelly (mmm...diesel), and if one is not careful, one can dump dirt on one's head. Not that I would ever do such a thing while I was learning how to use it.

But they're definitely the right tool for a lot of jobs that involve moving a lot of dirt around. It was a lot trickier to maneuver near the play structure with a bunch of people around to dig out a little more for the play area. But still hecka fun.

Blog Action Day

Today is Blog Action Day. This year's focus is on poverty. Will 10,000+ bloggers writing about poverty end it? No. It probably won't even make a major blip in traditional media coverage, which is focusing on the U.S. elections, the economic meltdown, and the never-ending war in Iraq. What it will do is get more people thinking about the problem and what they can do to help fix it.

Poverty is a complex and far-reaching problem, and it can feel overwhelming to be faced with such a huge problem. So one approach is to focus on what you can do. Volunteer with a local food bank. Donate even a small amount of money to provide clean water (there are 1.1 billion people in the world without access to safe drinking water.) Volunteer with your local Habitat for Humanity affiliate.

But do something, and together we can make a difference.

Heroes

No, not the random-people-with-extraordinary-powers TV series, but CNN's annual award for ordinary people with extraordinary hearts. With today's news coverage full of depressing news about the economy, politics and the environment, it's nice to be able to read some good news. Each of the 10 was given $25,000 by CNN. You can vote for your favorite; the winner will receive an additional $100,000.

They're all pretty amazing people, for example, my favorite:

Phymean Noun, Toronto, Ontario --
Growing up in Cambodia, Noun struggled to complete high school. Today, she offers hundreds of Cambodian children who work in Phnom Penh's trash dump a way out -- through free schooling and job training. peopleimprovement.org

And keeping this post connected with home construction, there's:

Liz McCartney, St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana --
McCartney moved to New Orleans to dedicate herself to helping Hurricane Katrina survivors move back into their homes. Her nonprofit St. Bernard Project has rebuilt the homes of more than 120 families for free.

How cool are those?

I was able to go on the Carter Work Project with Habitat for Humanity to the Gulf Coast earlier this year, and although coverage of Ike's destruction is already fading from people's memories, there's still tons to do from Katrina, Rita, et al, 3 years later.

In any event, go read the article, and be inspired by these people, and vote!

This Old Recyclable House

There's a great article over at the NY Times on deconstruction of houses to reuse as many of the building materials as possible, and recycle most of the rest. It takes a lot longer than just knocking a building down with a bulldozer, but in the end keeps a lot of stuff out of landfills:

The Stanford archaeologist William Rathje, who spent decades excavating landfills, has estimated that construction and demolition debris, together with paper, account for "well over half" of what America throws out. He called it one of a few "big-ticket items" in the waste stream actually worthy of the debates we have over merely "symbolic targets" like disposable diapers.

Rebuilding a house is usually better than tearing it down, but even remodeling generates a lot of waste:

Remodeling actually ends up generating more than one and a half times the amount of debris every year that demolishing homes does.

And in some cases, like the houses in the article, looters have damaged some parts of abandoned houses, and it's a better use of the materials to help someone else fix the house they're still living in.

Interestingly, as people are rediscovering with food, it pays to stay as local as possible:

Moreover, a study Guy wrote with two environmental engineers uncovered an empirical argument for keeping those materials local: on average, shipping them more than 20 miles away for resale can cancel out any energy conserved by reclaiming them.

I've tried to reuse and recycle as much as I can from our addition and remodel (the interior doors are from re-use sources, for example), but there's not much you can do with rotted, termite-filled wood that has paint or creosote on it like I got from the old front porch.

Locally, we've got a lot of choices for reusing materials. There's Urban Ore, Ohmega Salvage, and my favorites, the Habitat ReStore and The ReUse People store. I've donated stuff to and bought stuff from both. The ReUse People specialize in deconstruction of buildings as described in the article, and the Habitat ReStore helps support Habitat for Humanity's mission of elimination substandard housing.

And there's always freecycle.org. Besides acquiring or getting rid of random stuff that the above aren't interested in, occasionally various construction and remodeling materials are offered up. I've received a couple of sheets of drywall for the cost of driving a couple of miles to pick them up, and given people bits and pieces they could use. It's a win-win...what's not to like?