I spent Tuesday morning pulling the benches away from the garage. I had been dreading this only because I consider the deck sacred. It came away without too much fuss thanks to the carriage bolts we used. If the whole thing had just been screwed together... or worse, nailed, it would have been a nightmare. As it was I'll probably need to replace the only board that I had to remove (the top railing board) because backing out the screws caused some damage.

This freed up the garage space, so I started there with the 1X3X8 furring strips. I've been buying them at Lowe's. They look a lot nicer than the ones I got at Carter. Lowe's is a little bit of a hike, and they cost 10 cents more there, but they're straight and have clean edges. So, the Alero has been behaving well as my impromptu work truck. I can fit 36 boards in it. That sounds like a lot, but it really isn't, as you can see from the pictures.

After all this wood cutting I broke down and bought a miter saw. I went with the Ridgid 10" MS1065LZA 28513, which should make cutting those pesky furring strips much easier. Also, I bought an Irwin plywood blade that I plan to use for cutting the vinyl siding. Apparently the more teeth the better, so the blade I got has 180 teeth, and I guess you're supposed to turn it backward so as not to splinter the vinyl. I'll let you know how it works.

I ran into a few difficult spots yesterday after the garage was finished. There's a trim board along the gables I'm stuck working with. It's nailed onto the house and catches the nails from the roof decking too, so removing it is not an option. It shouldn't be that big of a deal, but it extends out farther than the furring strips. Also, there's flashing above the brickmold on all the windows. It's going to take some time to finagle that stuff... I don't want to tear it out.

All this work as made me 1) sore 2) aware of the fact that building, or remodeling, is like writing. How, you ask? Everyone does things their own way. If you want 15 different opinions on how something should be done, go to the hardware store. However, at the end of the day it's you and your saw, or you and your hammer and the only person you're trying to please is yourself. But you start off as an apprentice, I suppose. I don't know. It's weird.