The Honest Courtesan

We finally got two warm days without rain, and were thus able to get the cottage roof headers connected to each other and to the surrounding structure. Welding and plasma cutting both require a ground connected to the metal being welded; since it’s a pain to have to keep moving he ground clamp around, it’s helpful to avoid “orphan” structural members, such as the roof headers were prior to making these connections. But now the header on the northwest cottage (which is the one I’m standing on in this picture) is connected to the larger structure over the new bathroom (not visible in this picture), and also to the beam that forms the roof peak (center of the picture); that let me weld the connection between the headers (lower left, under the apple branch I have since pruned off) and the beam connecting the southeast cottage to the structure atop the shop.  Later on, we also welded a beam from the peak of the second cottage to the structure over the central post.  The rain hasn’t yet stopped; it has appeared every day this week.  However, it’s mostly been in the morning, leaving the afternoons clear; you’ll see what we did after this next week!