Wherein I Get All High and Mighty on the GC

Thursday was Day 4 of construction, or The Day We All Sat Around And Scratched Our Heads About What To Do. There was a lot of haunted debris that needed to be exhumed, and the little dozer originally tasked with our lot was going to take well into the next century to dig it up. We might as well have been out there with teaspoons.

The GC, made some calls, and found out he could get an Excavator (The Grand Daddy Master) out on the site on Monday when it finished up another job. So imagine our surprise when on our way home from work on Friday, we came across this:

Now we're talking. If we're going to put in a pool, we might as well go the distance and aim for an ocean. We were overcome with tears of joy happy to see some major and unexpected progress. High Five for a good end to week one. They even managed to bring in a small load of the new and improved dirt that will actually be supporting our house.
We were hopeful over the weekend and the start of week 2 did not disappoint.

I should stop and mention at some point, that in a past life, I was a civil engineer, and took riveting classes like Earth Slopes and Bituminous Mixtures. Up until this point, this experience has served me zero help in this process. However, I do remember learning about the different types of soil compaction equipment in geotech, and the sheepsfoot roller always stuck in my mind. I have no idea why, it is one of those random facts that gets stored in your brain under "completely useless trivia." But. BUT. I finally saw an opportunity to use that part of my brain! Or acknowledge it's existence! In the weekly meeting on Friday with the GC, I asked if they planned to use a sheepsfoot roller for compaction, you know, nonchalantly. The GC looked at me like I was a little wackadoo and said, "No we're going to use a regular roller." I felt a bit sheepish [terrible, terrible pun] and shut my trap. Well guess what got delivered to the site over the weekend?

That, my friends, is a sheepsfoot roller. SEE DAD. That engineering education you paid through the nose for was 100% legit.

I'm done gloating now.

Monday, the trashy dirt was all hauled away and our pretty dirt was delivered, packed and graded. There was even wood laying (lying? which is it?) on the site in anticipation of putting up the forms.

Full steam ahead, by today forms were up, and we even had all the sanitary sewer/gray water piping in. We are hoping they will get to pour the concrete foundation this week so it can cure during the good weather supposedly coming this weekend (I believe the foundation has to sit untouched for a week according to code, but I'll report back). Before that, the rebar needs to be laid out for the post tension slab. With any luck, we will get started on sticks (framing) by the end of next week or the beginning of the following. That will make it feel real, I hope...