The days get away from me, that's for sure. Mr. TroutBend got me a birthday card this year, probably from the Dollar Store, but it's the thought that counts. He didn't sign it in case I want to re-use it for someone else, but I'm not sure to whom I would give such tacky card. The thought that counts, I know.

We had a nice steak dinner courtesy of cabin guests who paid $44 for four thick rib eyes from Safeway that they didn't get around to cooking up while they were here. We will have the other two for our 37th wedding anniversary later this month, right before he goes to Las Vegas for the winter.

I have to tell you, things were not looking well for the red cabin project. We had the roof removed by the house mover who was going to raise up the logs in order to put the new foundation under it, and he overcharged us for it, but he did get it done in one day, so maybe it was worth it. Next, we were looking at paying him $8000 or more to raise it up, and the builders who were bidding on completing it said it should be moved out into the yard so they could work on the foundation, but he claimed that would cost a lot more, and be a lot more work. He started yelling at me: 'Well, okay, if you want to pay a whole lot more to have it moved, and overpay for concrete you don't need, if that's what you want, to pay a whole lot more, if that's what you want ...' I told him I wasn't saying I wanted that, I was just telling him what the builder said.



That and a couple of other things, and I decided I didn't like his attitude, so would not continue working with him, even though I didn't know who I could get to replace him.

I found out from the county that we can tear the whole place down and start fresh, so then it was a matter of what the builders would charge if they didn't have to deal with the logs and the inconvenience of not being able to work. Previously, I'd gotten an estimate of $150,000 to start fresh, and it would be more if they had to deal with the logs. We're not going to spend that for a 700 square foot cabin.

So imagine my surprise when another bid came in today for $66,000. Mind you, that's to make a storage building with the electric and plumbing roughed in, not a habitable structure. Some day someone could finish it out and do some of the work themselves to save money. But it includes everything, including dismantling the existing logs and setting them aside on the lot. We wouldn't have to do another thing except move our stuff back in there for storage.

We still haven't decided to get rid of this piece of a Waste Management dumpster or keep it as flood art.



Here's a picture from the 1976 flood that happened on July 31, the day before Colorado Day, and it was Colorado's 100 year anniversary as a state. Our canyon was full of tourists that night because there were many motels along the river at that time, and at least 200 more summer cabins and small homes - they were destroyed in that flood.



144 people died in that flood, many of them in cars trying to escape from the canyon. But a lot of them were in houses and the motels. Every year there is a memorial for the flood victims, and scholarships are awarded to their survivors.