Diary of a House: D Day

Anticipation and online teaching preparation. The drive across town is oh so quiet, and quick. Jamie and Cam are putting up corbels this morning and we check spacing. Jamie holds them on the wall while I guesstemate distance. I widen the space on the plan to avoid busy walls. The lack of lead lights has left empty spaces in the south wall and Kirk could only source enough plywood to cover the front and garage doors. I go to see Phil, the school caretaker. He's got some and even offers to drop it off. Schools are unbelievable places for contacts to solve problems.
In the English office we check lists for kids we need to give paper resources to, and for who needs a computer. In the middle I get an e-mail from AFS NZ who have booked Kahu a ticket home. I video call him. He's had a few false starts and is more concerned with fluffing up his hair.
I'm last out of the English block and pick up fish and chips for Jamie and Cam. We sit on paint buckets and swop news. Jamie's got pink batts to put in his house and Cam is staying put with his dog. Kirk arrives with the front door which should fit the opening now, and the round window which has been splendidly restored.
They leave and I stay to fill nail holes. Fiona calls in with a thermos of tea. She's stoked with the house. Fitting she's on site when a Tom calls round to buy the last stump of the liquid amber. Fi helped cut the tree up last September because it was too big for the rebuild. She's got a shed of firewood for this winter. Tom is going to use the stump for an anvil and shows us his iron work. Reckons he could sort decorative work to put between the verandah posts There's hours of nail hole filling work and I haven't got the knack yet. I soldier on. The radio is dismal. Doom and gloom. Silver lining- I buy the cheapest petrol for years, $1.65/ litre.
Another late, cold swim at the beach. Might be my last. I finish the evening with a Zoom book group meeting. I listen and can't participate cos i can't unmute the link on my phone. Where's a teenager when you need them? I revert to computer. and surprise myself by making it work. Still reading War and Peace, building to Napoleon moving his army into Russia. An epic story for epic times.