Let's Talk About Fences, Man.

FENCES, MAN.

One night about a week ago, the pressure of not having a privacy fence in our backyard really got to me.

"That's it! You people have stood in my way long enough—I'm building a fence!"

So I went down to Home Depot and bought the required materials to build 260 ft. of fence. Trying to justify such an enormous purchase, I was thinking of buying plain lumber to help defray the amount of debt I was wiggling myself into, but the guy placing my order—who bore an uncanny resemblance to Cleveland Browns running back Reuben Droughns—talked me into buying the treated, more expensive lumber. The picture on the left shows the 2x4x16's, the 2x4x8's, and the 4x4 posts and the 30 bags of Sackrete. It does not show the 525 pickets that were housed at Home Depot until June 10.

Anyway, we—Marshall and I—started work last Saturday, June 4. Our uneducated way of deciding where exactly the fence would run looked something like this:


The process of fence-building is an odd and curious thing—in that, the difficulty of labor decreases with every stage. Digging 17 - 2 ft. deep holes (the bottom foot of which is entirely red clay) proved to be a two day affair.













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The setting of the 4x4x8 posts was, thankfully, much easier, but still—mixing Quickcrete for 17 holes is a pretty daunting task. The photo on the right shows the inaugural post.




















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After all the posts were set, the ease of tacking on the braces made the prior four days of work seem like a joke. I should mention at this point, we were packing a 300 PSI air compressor and accompanying nail gun.


Anyway, the left, longer side is finished and the right side should be finished by week's end. More photos to come!

Meanwhile, here are some progression pictures:












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