Hey guys! I'm back! The trip to Chicago was interesting in that it was quite different. We went there basically to pick up our #2 grandson from his drop off from sleep away camp in Wisconsin and then send him off to to a three week trip to Israel with kids from the same camp. He was supposed to go last summer, but it was waylaid by COVID. We first met him at my daughter's, husband's, sister's in laws. His brother in law and sister live in LA. His brother in law's brother is famous! He is one of the two-man team that wrote and produce Game of Thrones for HBO. He won and EMMY for this and got very, very rich. He's also an accomplished rock and classical guitar player. We didn't meet him, but spent a day with his parents and got lots of interesting stories about GoT, it's production and cast.
Chicago is looking more and more llke Dubai every time we visit. There are four 900+ foot skyscrapers being built at the same and many more on the books. I don't know who's investing in all this real estate. It looks kind of like a bubble, especially since 40% of the people who were forced to work from home during the plague are choosing to continue to do so.
This is One Chicago on State Street. It's rental and condo. You can get a studio for the low, low price of $1.6mm and it goes up from there to $28mm. I'll stick to Louisville. If I was rich, I'd love to live in downtown Chicago. It's one of my favorite cities. I liken it to NYC without the attitude. How'd like to be that crane operator that has to go up into that thing every morning? The boom is in the clouds. In the early 80s, I watched a skyscraper go up right next to the building in which I was working. It was fascinating watching the guys working on high steel. But the creme de la creme was watching them take the tower crane apart. The crane lowers itself to the ground one segment at a time. One of the steel workers, who actually started dating one of the secretaries in our building, actually was swinging on the little winch that hangs below the crane mechanical base. He was showing off. Below him was 500 feet straight to the ground with nothing to impede his fall. NO FEAR!
The crane has hydraulic jacks below the top that jack the crane up a few feet so the segment below can be slid out from under the crane. That where this little winch comes in. It's on a track so the segment can be moved out over the street. The main crane then grabs the segment and lowers it to the street. The jacks then lower the crane to the next segment and the cycle begins again. It is astounding to me that more of these cranes don't crash to the street. BTW: the highest paid job on the site is the guy who drives that.
I finally got back into the shop today. I got a lot done on the front of the entry hall. I also made an error which I'll correct the next time. I opened up the wall for the elevator in the 2nd level. There shouldn't be an opening since this is the outside wall. The inside gets the opening on each level which i did correctly. Since I ran out of scale 2 X 6 and used 3 X 6s instead. Won't matter to anybody but me.
In this image I've flipped the wall over to put in the blocking from this direction so it will come out flush with the front timbers. I also have to install the floor ledges on this side. I trimmed the long from wall so it fits perfectly on the base plate. In the wrong area that I highlighted, I'll be filling this space with studs. There's a lot of blocking in the front wall and I have to locate the other half of the stair ledges so they're at the same height.
