Relative Something

Before starting

The day yesterday offered prime conditions for building an igloo and I just barely squeaked out enough time in the afternoon to get started on my first attempt of the year. It went pretty well for me, considering I worked alone for most of the time. This had its advantages, as well as disadvantages. I am prone to working rather slowly when by myself, which does nothing toward getting the project done in a timely fashion. But, alone, I am able to take as much time as I want to practice my technique of packing the dry snow into my ICEBOX frame. I must have learned something from my inaugural build last winter, as yesterday, out of the 2 full rows I accomplished, none of the blocks collapsed after removing the frame. Eventually, my next door neighbors, Matt and 3 of his daughters, arrived to assist. That allowed me to narrow my focus to just the packing step,

Beginning second row

as Matt and the girls provided an ongoing flow of perfectly prepared snow. By the time we were ready to quit, the sun had set and the temperature was dropping noticeably. That seemed to play nicely to my haste to reach a satisfying point for stopping, as the packed snow seemed to re-freeze in its new shape as fast as we finished filling it. Finding time to finish the rest of this project is a problem I have no solution for at this point. The calendar is kind of busy this time of year.

Starting up the ramp to row 2

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