The light rain that started late yesterday afternoon continued off-and-on through the overnight hours. We awoke to heavily overcast skies but a forecast that called for dry conditions until the early afternoon. We were up at 7:15 AM and had our usual granola breakfast. I took some more Ibuprofen in advance of working in the bus. We were just getting ready to have our morning coffee when I noticed several cars in the driveway. It was 7:45 AM and the roofers were arriving. Pat Davidson was among them so I went outside to chat briefly with him.
We had our morning coffee and then got to work, Linda at her desk and me in the bus. I spent another two hours using the Makita 11 pound power chisel. By 11 AM I had removed as much material from the floor as I felt was worth the effort. Linda brought the camera out and took a few photographs of me at work after which I packed up the equipment, closed up the bus, and went to Home Depot in Howell to return it to their rental department.
I stopped at Lowe’s on the way home and ordered the new Frigidaire refrigerator for the bus, an FFHT1621QB (16.3 cu. ft., top freezer, black, no ice maker or water). I scheduled delivery for Friday July 3rd to Chuck’s shop in Novi. I will arrange with Chuck to take the bus their sometime after that when he is available to operate his fork lift and I can get Brendan or some friends to give us a hand.
Me using the Makita 11 lb power chisel to remove thinset and mastic from the floor of our H3-40. (Photo by Linda)
Work continued on the roof through the morning and then the crew tarped off the roof and left in a few of their vehicles for a long lunch. As forecast it started to sprinkle around 2 PM as they returned from their lunch break. It never rained hard and they kept on working but always with the tarps at the ready in case they were suddenly needed. One of the guys finished installing our two Velux Sun Tunnel skylights which required a tall step ladder in our living room. They looked very nice when he was done.
I had a chat with Jarel Beatty in Logansport, Indiana about the custom desk he is going to build for the bus. I sent him a follow-up e-mail describing the pullout pantry we also need him to build. I then spent an hour working on drawings before I had to quit and change clothes.
Kate had secured tickets through her cousin, Michaela, for this evening’s performance of The Bikinis at the Meadow Brooke Theatre at Oakland University in Rochester Hills. Kate suggested O’Conner’s Public House (Irish Pub) in Rochester for dinner. The roofers had been working in the living room installing the Velux Sun Tunnel skylights but were done by 3:45 PM. That allowed us to get cleaned up, dressed for the theatre, and out the door at 4:30 PM even though the roofers were still working up on the roof.
We got to the pub at 6 PM. Kate got there shortly before us and had ordered a soft pretzel appetizer before the happy hour prices expired at 6 PM. Conveniently there were three large sticks so we each got one. Kate got the cheesy dipping sauce and we split the spicy horseradish mustard, which really had a kick to it. Linda and Kate each had a Smithwicks ale and I had a pineapple ale. To paraphrase “the world’s most interesting man”: I don’t always drink beer, but when I do, I prefer a fruit beer. Not as mysterious as Dos Equis, or as authentic as Guinness, but it’s what I like. Kate had a regular (beef) burger and we both had black bean burgers on soft pretzel buns with fresh hand-cut French fries. The burgers and fries were both really good and the pretzel buns, which had been toasted on a grill, did not get soggy.
The musical was a lot of fun with a wonderful performance by the cast of four women. All four of them were on stage singing and dancing with a lot of energy for most of the performance. Their singing was excellent, each voice having its own unique quality but blending well, and they carried 4-part harmonies in tune with one another and the small 4-pieces band. Two of them, Bambi Jones and Jeanne Tinker, were also in the Meshuggah Nuns musical we saw a month or so ago at the Meadow Brooke Theatre.
The Bikinis is the last production that Kate’s cousin Michaela will work on at the MBT. The production run ends on Sunday and one week later she leaves for a summer stock gig in New England. Meadow Brooke Theatre is a wonderful venue but not convenient to where we live, even less convenient to where Kate works, and very inconvenient to where she lives. All of which is to say, I doubt that the three of us will be going there very often now that Michaela is moving on. That is too bad in a way as we have all enjoyed the shows we have seen. The fact that Michaela, as a cast/crew member, was able to get us tickets did not hurt.
Michaela met us in the lobby where Kate gave her a nice assortment of flowers. She then gave us a behind the scenes tour of the wardrobe area where she has spent the past year working on costuming. We walked out to our cars and by the time we all drove off it was 11 PM. Even with light traffic it took us almost an hour to get home but we arrived while it was still Thursday, albeit just barely.