I have always done most of my warm weather cooking outside. It saves a ton of money on the electric with the heat in the kitchen not being compensated for and fought by the A/C. It also prevents having to turn the A/C when the passive cooling of breeze, shade and updrafts can do the job of keeping it cool to a point. So for the new house I am building I decided to go all out on a patio with a large summer kitchen. I Dug the patio area out 6" deep and it will be 20' x 50' Fiber Concrete slab 2" of rock under 4" of Concrete. A lot of dirt comes out of a big 6" Deep Rectangle So hot the last couple days even Poo is miserable I am going to incorporate two good size post oak stumps into the patio. I have to bring the pressure washer down and blow all of the dirt and rocks away from the stump bases 6-8 inches below the dug out level line. Then use a carbide chain on the saw to cut out as many roots under the stumps as possible, without cutting the big tap roots. I will probably just use a couple of 5 gallon buckets of heated hot tar in the hole around and under the stumps. LOL I could just cut the tap roots and push the stumps out with a tractor but I think the stumps will look neat. I dug it all out with my little Kubota BX25D with the bucket. I will dig around the stumps with its backhoe to rip up as much of the root ball as I can. The little backhoe is only good for 2-2 1/2 inch diameter roots. The big roots require the chainsaw and cutting them into sections that the bakhoe can handle. I have 25 tons of #6 rock coming tomorrow to spread in 2" level layer and the concrete spinners will arrive in 2 weeks. Earliest I could get the trucks in. Every regional concrete company is swamped the I 57 project and my two most local are running concrete to the coal mine nonstop as well at the interstate rework. I drilled the holes and poured the footers out of my cement mixer yesterday to plant four 6x6x10L post on the front. They will hold the rafters for the lean to off the top of the house under the gutters. 2' under the ground and encased in the concrete on the top. And the rafters topped with the same color steel on the roof of the house. Will drop from 9' 6" on the house to 8' on the outside. After the concrete is solid and cure I am going to build a 36" block wall around it with a 8' double gate opening center front and top the holes with 2" thick patio pavers. Frame it in a bit and put the same screen material on it that I used on the commercial kitchen porch. For the kitchen part I am going to take the legs off of one of my Oklahoma Joe's Smokers that has a wood/charcoal side and a Propane Grill side, One of the Blackstone flat tops, the Big 8' Propane charbroiler, the smaller 4' wood charbroiler. And build them into the North wall and part of the east wall. Then build a stone wood fired oven. I am tinkering around with welding a steel box together and a diamond mess cover over it with 6 propane burners in it. Got too hot to be dicking around with the torch and the welder in the shop though. I may skip the big gas charbroiler and just run with the 4' wood burner. I did get a 20' long 4 fan hood/exhaust unit riveted together to put in over the the North end cooking area to vent the smoke out through the roof. LOL That sucker moves some air! I might have gone a little overkill using 4 greenhouse intake fans..... Might reduce them down to 2 of smaller intake fans. (They pull air from outside a high tunnel or greenhouse and circulate out the opposite end through the exhaust ports.) So will work fin for using them as hood fans LOL. I am pretty much stripping the grills, smokes and flat tops out of the Chuck Wagon Food Trailer and installing them in the patio kitchen. Going to finish the project up by bolting some table tops to the stumps and putting 2 good size ceiling fans in and some LED Lighting up in the rafters. And that is project #1 of concrete week. Project #2 is pouring a perm 6' x30' 6" thick pad for the new sawmill to sit nice and levels on. And #3 a 20'W 50' long 4" pad out at the Lake Recreation area to move my cabin over to and slide it off on. LOL and I am Renting a Power Trowel for Concrete Week! All total 27 yards of concrete or 4.5 loads. AND I AM NOT going to work it all by myself like I did with the 22 yards in a day! I have recruited a couple of friends to come help that week in exchange for beer and food (NOT BUD or anything else Inbev makes, not going to have Qweer Beer EVER not that I ever would have anyway. ) My current outdoor kitchen is just a Oklahoma Joe's and a Blackstone flat top under the Krap Kave Kanopy and a fire ring that my dutch ovens can hang over or sit in. I love my Black Stones! I can cook huge meals on them and they take about 3 minutes to clean after and be all shiny and oiled up for the next time. I did get a little 12" table top one for when I am only cooking for myself and Mrs Krap. I hate taking a week away from working on the house interior but I can only get the the heavy trucks in July through September. Getting the concrete work done sooner rather than later and out of the way......... Seems like the best plan to me. Going balls to the wall to get the Master Bedroom, Bathroom and The Corner room finished. We can move in with those 3 rooms complete. Have to get moved out of the Cabin and the Cabin emptied out and moved to the lake before the end of September, the Cabin qualifies as a heavy truck load, it weighs 30,000 pounds empty and is 16' W x 48' long. A friend started a portable building moving company and offered to mover the mile out to the lake for $500 which is a lot less than the other quotes I got that range from $2000-$2500. I suspect his Discount will involve food and beer I can move things like the containers around with my GN and Winch but the GN is pushing the limit with 16,000 pounds on it and no way mine can handle 30,000 pounds. He has a semi with a 48' lowboy flat bed that extends out and retracts 20'and tilts designed for loading and moving the big portable buildings. The Cabin is about as big as anyone makes a portable building. I was just going to buy a new 16x48 portable cabin for the lake site. They cost a whole lot more than the $12,000 I paid for the Cabin now days! Like $23,000-$25,000 now days. Even the lease to own Repos are running $20,000. There are a few companies building 16x60 portables now and those are running $34,000 plus a big oversize load transport fee. If I had the time I could build them myself for around $6500 in materials. They are not that complex just a framed, and skinned shell built on skids. Maybe next year I will build a couple or maybe I will just take a year off and fish and garden! Building the Lake and ponds and a couple of smaller projects last year, and the house/solar/Cancer this year........ I am not feeling very relaxed or retired LOL. A nice long not have to do anything year long vacation in 2024 is sounding pretty good right now
I like the rodent bait station on top of the stump. *Obviously* you are trying to only cull those that figure out how to climb.
Our family did something like that with the homestead build, which still exists today! Basically, they built a "garage" addition to the kitchen area that they used for all the canning, game processing, and heavy cooking, that way the heat wouldn't effect the house during the hot months! My Grand Dad installed twin electric fans up in the rafters to move air through from both sides, and also installed a full size garage door to the outside end which you could actually park a car in there if you had to! My Cousins live there now, and they keep it up same as it always was, but added twin fridges and a great big ice box, a giant red brisk and cedar smoke shack, and then added a portico to the outside for a dining area as well as a nice gathering spot for friends and family, with 5 humongous fir trees providing lots of shade! Got lots of fun memories of that, and it was a fun place to grown up!
They takes the special poison back to their nest and feed to their babies and all are inhumanely killed within 3-4 hours. The special poison does the same thing to the cute but very destructive little meadow mice but only faster. My version of the bucket trap is a 1/3 full water trough with a board that goes to the edge that they willing jump off of for a drink and drown.
Amazing! I am stunned with the scope of your projects, KK. You never half-step it, but go all in. Simply amazing! Please ensure to give us an update with photos in the near future. And, yes, I am a bit jealous too, especially about your fish ponds/lakes. LOL!
Lived in Guam for 7 years, and was familiar with the idea of an outdoor kitchen there. Pretty much for the same reasons, including the island humidity, along with the heat! Cook it outdoors, save on the A/C bill!! @Alanaana might be a bit familiar with it, too!
But, pellet pistols are so much more fun! Like big game hunting, learn their habits, stake out their feeding trails..... "POP!" Dead varmint!
True, but it’s hard to beat the efficiency of the buckets. Figure 4-5 rodents per bucket per day. Señor Krap is a busy man, he has so many projects going, he has no time to hunt all day!
Yes! We definitely used the outside kitchen way more than the inside one. The backyard to my Grandparent's house in Guam is literally the Marianas Trench. It's so convenient to cook whatever gets caught in the traps. I'm fantasizing about building a more permanent outdoor kitchen here in Hawai'i.
I pat myself so hard on the back over the ponds and lake project last year...... that I sometimes dislocate a shoulder They all turned out great, solid and leak free! Love watching the Semis with 25 ton rock loads rolling over the dams I built. The little pond dam gets a little hairy, I drove the Box Truck with the Chuck Wagon attached over it the other day. LOL it feel a lot more narrow than 25' wide when you are in something bigger than a pick up truck. Concrete week and finishing the loft rafters/joist ceiling, insulation and getting 40 sheets of 3/4" OSB up in the loft and screwed down are the last big hard physically abusive jobs left. After I am over that hump it is all just tedious but physically easy work. Plus with the ceilings done and insulated I can get some AC going on the first floor! Mrs Krap wants to help get the OSB up in the loft and she just can't. Those sheets are 65 pounds each and going up 9' that job is a lot harder than it sounds. I can get them leaned up on a wall top and lift/lean them to chest high and launch them up on the rafters and after about 10 I am getting wore out. And until I get the insulation on under the roof and the ceiling on up there the R6 spray foam does not help a whole lot in keeping it from getting hotter than hell in the loft. LOL you go into the loft cool and dry and come down 10 minutes later looking like you jumped in the lake and burning up Until I get the central rooms framed in, insulated and skinned and the roof packed to R38 and the end windows, AC and wing vent fans in, its just going to be miserable hot up there. Doing R30 in the rafters between first floor ceiling and loft, In the half I have that done in, it makes huge difference in the kitchen/dining/living room temp. Easily 40 degrees cooler in those rooms now. Was getting over 100 degrees on the first floor and highest temp I saw in the loft was 140 during the 3 hours of the day that sun hits the roof. Just can't work up there in that kind of heat unless you want to stroke out and die up there from that kind of heat. Mrs Krap blames herself for me getting so far behind schedule on the house. So she is trying to help me get caught up as much as she can. She is doing a lot better now and getting better every day. But she needs to accept that she is not a big strong 200 pound woman anymore. At her low she was 90 pounds not so long ago and at the last doc visit only back up to 120 pounds. Doc wants to see her at 150-155 pounds and level off there. And she is only 7 weeks out from the whipple procedure surgery and having a good portion of her insides reconstructed. So I limit her to handing me spacers and tools while I am up on the ladders. Which is a whole lot more helpful than she thinks it is. I am not getting any younger and those trips up and down the ladders make my knees feel like they are on fire now days. So less trips up and down the ladders is a blessing! She needs to heal up a lot more, help with the light stuff where she can and wants to. Her cancer markers have been in steep decline since the surgery and the new Chemo is not killing her or making her sick at all. It is also a 1 hour drip at a local infusion center VS the old chemo cocktail that was a 9 hour day at a infusion center 2 hours away and Chemo ball pump for 3 days after and another 4 hour round trip to get it removed. And all of the trips and stays at the hospital because of severe dehydration and her Blood Pressure bottoming out from the first chemo cocktail. Oncologist was insisting on 3 more sessions of that cocktail and thankfully Doc and the Surgeon tag teamed his ass and told him in no uncertain terms that chemo was done, after a kidney function test prior to a CT scan put her at 9% Kidney function and the machine could not pick up her blood pressure... and the oncologist told me to take her home and have her drink lots of fluids. The hospital we were at would not admit her or let her in the ER unless the oncologist authorized it. So I took her to red lifted her in and hit the warp engine and made the 40 mile drive to Docs office, Doc took one look at her in Red and said get her to the Hospital NOW, I will be right behind you! Doc is the Chief of internal medicine at that hospital and had IVs, the best urologist in the area and a crash cart waiting for her at the door. Mrs Krap was total out of it at that point. They got the IVs pumping at max, had to intubate her and pump her full of potassium and magnesium 7 days later in the ICU she was stabilized, hydrated and her kidney function back up to 80%. Doc blunt as always told me it was 50/50 as to whether she would survive. He crawled all the way up the oncologist ass and told him "YOU ARE INCOMPETENT IDIOT AND YOU ARE FIRED AS FAR AS THIS PATIENT GOES!" I have never seen Doc lose his cool or get red faced raging mad before. 3 days in she woke up and they pulled the breathing tube out. 7th day they declared her stable and kept her 3 more days in a regular room for observation 8th day I took her to Evansville for the Surgery 9 days later I brought her home and she has been steadily recovering since. LOL She has a new Oncologist now btw. and 10-12 Months of the new chemo 3 weeks on 1 week off. As long as she tolerates it like she has been and keeps getting better I am good with everything as it is. Doc is not her Doc but he sees her every other week to check her out and make sure everything is good. She has a whole new respect for Doc, she never liked him before and always called him a asshole with no bedside manner. That all changed since Doc most likely saved her life by having everything ready when we rolled up to the ER door and skipped all of the formalities of checking in. She was literally at deaths door when they pulled her out of Red and started going to work on her still on the sidewalk. This cancer shit has been a wild ride from last November to when she came back home from the surgery. I don't blame her at all for getting so far behind on things. Hell if it would have kept her alive I would have burned the house down. Told her today "I don't ever want to hear again about everything being so far behind is your fault! Lets put the blame where it belongs.... It is the damned cancers fault and there is nothing you could have done to change that." Hell I am just thrilled she has survived and is on the upswing . Nothing else has really mattered to me since this all started. It is about all I can do to NOT snap the original oncologist neck when I see him strutting around the infusion center acting like big shit. I think he might sense this as he actively avoids me. That 40 mile trip running 140 mph.......... SMFH she could have died at any time between Eldorado and Marion and the little dumb fuck wanted me to take her home and drink plenty of water! Ok I am not over that yet and still build up a good rage remembering it. But she is a whole lot better now but still a long way from where she was. My run in SE Asia is a motivator in this. I spent a good bit of time in S Korea and Malaysia with a few visits to Cambodia and Thailand and a whole lot more time working and hopping around in South and Central America. For the record I still actively avoid the meat on a stick at the Chinese Buffets LOL it might be Chicken then again it might not be chicken........... It could very well be a cousin of the Chipmunkies.... or Poo....... or it could be just plain old Spider Monkey I have always had interest in regional cooking and techniques aside from the mystery meats. Almost every culture in hot areas has the primary kitchen outside or in a very open room. The Climate along the DMZ in Korea is very much like the Climate in Southern IL. The Same hold true for many parts of South America and then throw in Grandmas outdoor summer kitchen where in all cases most if not all of the cooking is done outside for the same reasons. It just makes a lot of sense. LOL I joined the army to be a cook and hey there was a $9,000 sign on bonus to choose the cook MOS. After basic more important people than me decided I was going to take a different path and AIT. and became something very much different than a Cook in a mess hall. But never lost my love of cooking and learning new things and ways to cook. So wherever I was I spent my down time exploring the regional cuisine and set ups. Always swore that when I retired I was going to make kitchen that was a combination of Bolivian, Brazilian, Korean, Malay and good old fashioned primitive American. Just with screens, more sanitary practices and no roaches or rodents on or off the stick Larry on the other hand spent his down time exploring the regional whores and always seemed to have the Monday morning screams in the latrine, I know this because more than a few times I was in a stall having a different kind of Monday Morning Screams in the latrines. When you indulge in the local cuisines of either variety there is risk LOL.
Throw some peanuts on the stump and can shoot tree rats and chipmunkies all day long........and save wiring harnesses on tractors and trucks with every kill.
Happy to hear the Mrs is doing a lot better ,, hope it all continues. I love hearing about your projects ,,being in the business,, I can understand exactly what your doing, and know exactly what you're going thru trying to do some of that yourself,, if I were closer I believe I'd be glad to help you out with some of them projects . Sometimes work ain't work if you're enjoying what you're doing.
RAFTERS and Loft Floor Joist!!!! I am spanning the wings with single 2x6x16s nailed to load bearing walls and beams. and triple sistering them with 2x6x14s down the center on 2 load bearing walls and 2 load bearing beams. Spans on the wings are 12' without load bearing beams or walls under them on 16" centers. Not exactly to State Code but the State will never see it And it is perfectly safe and sturdy enough for light maintenance. LOL the Cabin I spanned the loft with 2x6x16s on 24" centers and floored with 3/4 OSB and it has no up and down flex. Code wants 2x8 min on the wings and 2x10s on the central floor joist, never mind that tripled 2x6s are twice as strong as single 2x10s. and three 2x6x14 cost less than one 2x6x14. LOL I rarely share pics of the inside as there is always the OMG YOU ARE USING 1x6 White Pine For RAFTERS AND JOIST!!! It gets old explaining spans and load bearing Pounds Per Square foot. This pic is from a couple of weeks ago when I was putting 2x6x16s up and making the single board spans. Across the center I put a 14' on either side of the 16s drilled through and bolted together with 4 bolts on either side of the 16s to join it all together + a whole lot of 3.5" nails from either side. I am NOT thrilled with the fabricated I Beam and 6x6 treated post it sits on in the master bedroom. I have since drilled through and two half inch bolts hold the I Beam to each of the 3 post now. It ain't Purdy but it ain't gonna break It is also temporary. I used my Chainsaw Mill to make a 22' long 10" Diameter half round beam from a nice straight and solid small Red Oak Log. And three 10" Diameter Post Oak logs 1 full round for the center and two 3/4 round for the ends. Drilled out holes to the core of all every foot to half the water evaporate out out of the post but still going to be a year or more before they are fully cured and bone dry and done shrinking down. The post and beam in the pic will be replaced with the oak beam and post when they are. LOL going to but the 22' beam in half and joint it together overhead with the center of the joint on the center post. I can't conjure enough help in any reality to get a 19' 10" long 10" diameter solid oak beam up there. Four of us big guys should be able to carry it in as halves and balance it on the scissor lift to raise it up one half at a time. Post will be easy just need to cut the base into square 6x6 and stand them up in the existing floor bracket and bolt or lag screw them in secure. I just hate doing rafters and joist period. Not bad with 2-3 guys helping, a total PITA up and down, up and down.. Space and nail, down and up space and nail and repeat over and over......... Not to mention putting all of those boards up there. Only nailing the spacers down on the bedroom beam the rafters are just going to rest on the beam so it will only be a matter of unbolting the beam and pulling 6 nails out to lower it down when the perm beam and post are ready to go up. Bedroom is 16' Wide and 19' 10" long and the loft bedroom off center on top of the master bed is 12' Wide and 19' 10" long... Maybe two connected bedrooms up there jury is still out on that one. But had to have the master bedroom beam to support the Joist under those loft rooms and reduce the bedroom span from 16' down to 10' I was going to put the beam dead center and only have 8' spans but Mrs Krap Strongly Objected wanting 6' on the center wall side between wall and post and 10 Feet on the outer wall between it and post. Anyway when the rafters, joist, ceiling, insulation and OSB loft floor is all up and put together. My life gets a whole lot easier! Electrical, Plumbing, putting up light 1/4" plywood sub wall skin is just not that physically demanding just kind of slow and time consuming. And Mrs Krap can be A LOT more helpful with things like pulling wire through and she is faster than I am at wiring outlets up. Right now she is just not feeling very useful on the house project. Doc says no lifting anything over 15 pounds and no putting stress on the the abdomen for another 6 weeks. She had a lot of intestine, Bile Duct, veins pulled together and reconstructed. Last thing we want is to over stress any of that and spring a internal leak and have to go back under the knife to fix it. A nice long slow over cautious recovery is what it is going to be whether she likes it or not LOL I wish Mini me was about 2' taller She has the heart and strength just not the size and height yet. If she turns out like her Mom she will grow up to be a 6' tall Amazon. One of the neighbors kids told her "You are just a girl and need to learn your place!" LOL she knocked him on his ass and broke his nose as a bonus. Just a 10 year old girl vs a 13 year old boy. Guess he told his dad that he crashed his bike and face planted........... I would probably take that route as well before admitting a little girl kicked my ass and broke my nose hehe.
at the reference to "meat on a stick"!! My Navy days, visiting Subic Bay (and the city of Olongapo) in the Philippines, taught me all about that subject! Papa-san, squatting in front of the hibachi charcoal grill, selling meat on a stick.... "Papa-san, what kind of meat you selling" "This pork....this beef" Now, you know ol' Papa-san ain't seen a steer cow in years, and even pigs aren't always in good supply! Maybe dog? Rat? Something else?? Didn't much matter....so long as it tasted good, and you washed it down with an ice cold San Miguel, you were good to go!
Same here ^^^^^ when I was in the CCP and other areas , USSR was also areas to look after what went down , & didn't come back up. Man were going back decades . Sloth
