Being Saturday, some of the workers finished up at noon, while some others continued to work throughout the afternoon. Many of those finishing up mid-day went home to Chiclayo and will return for work on Tuesday. Those staying will work another half day tomorrow.

Much of the work today focused on finishing the walls. They apply another layer of sand/cement mixture over the brick walls. They make several "markers" to get the correct the depth. They use the plumb bob to be sure the surface is straight up and down and will pull a string line from end to end to ensure the evenness of the wall. They then splatter cement onto the wall and smooth it out using square tubes of aluminum. The final finish is put on with paddles. I'm amazed at how even and smooth the walls end up even though they are done in sections.

The last two column of the dining room were framed and poured today. The next columns will be the ones for the water tower. Controversy or not, we will locate the water towers where we need to for adequate pressure and in a location we think will minimize the disruption to Georg's view. He won't like it, but we don't see any way around impacting his view in some way. We have kept all of the construction one meter below the floor level of his house. The only structure that will exceed this will be the water tower; which it must to provide the gravity feed pressure necessary for functioning showers and toilets.

The floor in the master bedroom has now been poured and is ready for tile. The tile is supposed to arrive sometime this next week. To me, this feels like another milestone in terms of progress. The tiles will go in for the upper level, while the cement is poured for the lower level. The carpenter is supposed to return this week to continue the roof out over the lower level.

We did not get to blog last night as we had both computer cables fried and couldn't get them to charge the computers. We don't know what is happening with the electrical system at Georg's, but obviously something is not right. The electrician was supposed to come back today, but we didn't see him. Given our experience, we've decided not to use power at Georg's to charge our computers and electronics. We do have a couple of generators that we might plug into, and hopefully they will deliver more reliable current. The upshot of this is that we will probably not be able to blog every night. Tonight we are at El Refugio, a local hotel, using their electricity to charge and blog by. So please be patient with us. We will blog when we can.

We went to Talara today to find new computer cables. The store had one cable that would work, and we will have to wait for another one to come in for the second lap-top.

While we were there, we stopped in at the vet's office. Stormy had numerous ticks in her ears that she would not allow us access to to remove. The vet removed them while Doug and I both held Stormy still. There was one spot on her head behind her ear he told me to rub which calmed her immensely. Good to know. So now, all the ticks are removed from her ears and her feet. He also noticed a lot of irregularity in her coat. He felt she had an allergy; probably to the ticks that she was breaking out from. He gave us some medication to give her with her food morning and night for the allergy. He also gave us a spray to treat her with for the ticks. What a pain! Hopefully this spray will do the trick. As it is, I am doing tick searches morning and night, trying to keep them under control.
Stormy doesn't seem particulary bothered by the ticks. She is happy, active and such a joy for us. She has such a nice temperament and has been very quick to learn her manners. When we walk, she generally heels quite well. She will sit and lay down on command. She will generally come when called, depending on whether she thinks you are wanting her toy or not!