Whee! that was a great evening-and-day.

This time I decided to build the wall flat on the floor and slide it into place at the end. If you have enough space (I don’t, quite) then this is a much nicer way to work than building it in situ. You can bang the nails straight in from where the floor and ceiling are going to be rather than fannying around hammering nails at diagonal angles, moving the wood out of position.

Somehow among the reclaimed wood two bits were about 1cm longer than all the others, and also somehow I managed to unwittingly select these for the end studs. So I built a big square then found none of the studs stretched across the gap. Some unhammering and a bit of sawing later it all fitted.

I also re-learned the lesson about using reclaimed nails: just don’t. It’s about 11.8 times as hard to bang in a nearly-straight nail than it is to bang in a straight one. And a straight one with a crooked head is even worse. So four reclaimed nails in, I switched to shiny new ones.

Tilted up the wall and wrestled it into position. My mathematician’s side told me it wouldn’t fit, but knowing that wood is forgiving and I have a big hammer, I went ahead. There was a moment of mild concern when it looked like the wall was about half a centimetre longer than the hole it was supposed to go in, but on correctly seating the other end, and whacking it with the big hammer, it all came right.

It’s probably premature to fit wall 2, since the floor, ceiling, and bath replacements will all be easier without it, but (a) in situ is the best place to store it and (b) I really wanted the emotional buzz of seeing it in place. And I got that alright! Seeing it in place was roughly equivalent in satisfaction to successfully lighting 11 barbecues at once whilst playing keepy-uppy.