Tales from Pentoga

The ramp to the bottom of the pond was finished on Monday and digging begun on the bottom.

June 25, 2019 - Tuesday morning

68 degrees/clear skies/windy

Pentoga Road

I'm sitting here fat and sassy this morning as I THINK I'll be finished with digging the hole at the bottom of the pond today.

No guarantees, but the ramp was completed yesterday, tons and tons of dirt and rocks were moved, and digging began before day's end.

It's a long ramp that goes down into that thar' hole!

More about digging later.

I began doing some minor auto body repair on the Kia after Sargie left Monday morning. A bit of sanding here, a little primer and paint.

Whoops, a bit of surface rust seemed to have eaten right through the back quarter panel. Ouch.

There was nothing to do but start grinding, much like a dentist does when drilling out a cavity.

One thing for sure, if it's not clean, the rust will just keep chomping away from the inside out.

While in college and even after, many many years ago, I had a little side line business of repairing rust damage on older vehicles. It was something I enjoyed and considered more of an art type thing than automotive.

The hole in the Kia was filled with mesh, then filled with some super duper auto putty.

It was onto sanding, filling, sanding, filling, sanding, and filling, until the hardened epoxy blended in with the original surface.

After that, came primer and a bit of paint and boom, that repair job was good 'nuff to be done.

We've managed to mow down a herd of deer with the little Kia over the years and now refer to the little black bullet as a four-wheeled deer magnet. I no longer buy a hunting license and haven't had my rifle out in years. If we were desperate for meat, we'd only have to drive down the road.

With each deer comes a new dent, bumper cover, grill, quarter panel, door, etc. etc. The major ones have been professionally repaired, but the smaller dents, bumps, and bruises, remained as no insurance company wants to spend several thousand dollars on an old car with a quarter of a million miles showing on the odometer. They'd simply give us a few hundred dollars and total the car.

Problem is, the Kia still runs like new. It gets anywhere between 34 and 42 miles to the gallon, uses no oil, and is fun to drive. More importantly, it's paid for.

Sargie and I love her little car. We were told when we first purchased it that if the oil were changed regularly and we kept up with basic maintenance, it would last well over 300,000 miles. It appears the mechanic knew what he was talking about.

We're taking the Kia to Mom's this weekend. The Equinox is more comfortable, but it also sucks up twice as much gas.

As long as I was in the autobody mood yesterday, I decided to fix a few snarls, dents, and dings.

I used to own a set of tools that aided in repairing such things, but they disappeared many many years ago. What I do have is some very hard hickory in the shop. Why not make my own custom tools just for the Kia?

A simple thingamajig. I made two others to fit inside the wheel wells, up into the front quarter panels.

The rest of the morning was spent manufacturing, pounding, grinding, and straightening.

I love this right angle attachment used to remove screws in tight places. It was a present from Sargie in years past.

Taking the snarl out of the front grill and hood

By morning's end, Sargie's Kia once again looked like something a person should drive rather than an addition to the local junk yard.

We'll give it a wash and wax later this week, a quick vacuuming of the inside, the windows washed, and mats scrubbed, and the little car should be good for the five-hundred mile drive to Indiana.

It looked like it was going to storm and I really wanted to finish digging the ramp. I began my usual maintenance procedure, checking the oil, fueling the backhoe, shooting grease into the zerks, etc.

Oh oh, a couple of the fittings didn't want to take grease.

Dang

When it comes to machinery, I'm probably OCD... a bit of a mental case for preventative maintenance. There was nothing to do but change the fittings.

Mississippi Brother Garry enjoys teasing how I wear latex gloves when working with grease. I'd go without, but I just don't have time to get a manicure this week.

In the end, I decided to change all the zerks (fittings). I was back in business.

The rest of the day was spent alternating between working up wood and digging. If it appeared it was going to rain, I'd hop off the backhoe and split wood under the trees.

Once the threat of lightening or rain diminished, I'd head back to the site and begin moving dirt again.

After a few hours, the trailer was 2/3rd's empty. A few pieces required splitting the old fashioned way, by hand, using a twelve pound maul.

Meanwhile:

Hey, Jambo, the honeyberries will be prime for picking next week. Get your bucket ready.

I enjoyed stuffing my face with the earliest honeyberries between digging and wood sessions. The berries are absolutely delicious and are good for eating fresh or making jams or pies.

Sargie closes the Vision Center tonight and doesn't go into work until one. I'm going to head out the door fairly soon and finish working up the wood in the trailer. It shouldn't take more than a couple of hours.

After, it will be back to the pond. I may be dreaming, but I hope to finish widening the hole today to a ten foot diameter, ten feet deep.

To ensure I don't go tumbling into the hole, I'll park the tractor at the top of the ramp and connect the backhoe to the tractor with a heavy logging chain.