Our daily routine at Focker’s involves playing a game we like to call “Focker Chess,” which is a matter of moving product around and around the building, in and out of trucks and back and forth across town between the store and the warehouse. Before the addition of Kitty the Pink Focklift, a game of Focker Chess used to include calling Randy’s Towing to haul Clark the Focklift behind the truck so that Clark would be available to pick something up in one place and put it down somewhere else.

Focker Chess is a game that can only be played with lots of stuff that’s always in the way of other stuff and it’s absolutely necessary to play Focker Chess in an area that is too small for half the stuff you have stuffed into it.

The game of Focker Chess oozed out of the building and expanded onto the construction site today.

Move One: The guys from Morrell Construction showed up early to seize the Shack v2.2 side of the building site.

Morrell starts framin' it up

Move Two: Everybody pitched in to unload Jan’s electronics and housewares truck into the back door of Focker Labs so that we could, as Doc put it, “get that truck the hell out of the way.”

Move Three: Doc and Donny busied themselves with moving the rod buster’s art project (which Jan correctly pointed out, “Hey! They look like tomato cages,”) out of the way of the warehouse foundation.

Tomato cages on a track hoe

Looks like we won’t be loading anything through the back door of Focker Labs for a while. It’s a jungle gym now.

Doc & Donny, as seen from the door of Focker Labs

Focker Chess will continue to spread into the parking lot for the rest of this week, as Doc’s next delivery of steel fights for territory with the Focker trucks, Clark the Focklift and Morrell’s 30 yard construction dumpster.

Several well-wishers stopped by to peek at the goings on and all asked us, “Are you glad to finally get this project going?”

In a word: YES!

Rush hour on the construction site

By the end of the day, Morrell Construction had Shack v2.2 framed up and were starting to hang some million dollar OSB. Doc and crew had the foundation site cleared up and marked off for tomorrow’s next step, which is called, “Donny finds the power line with a line locator before somebody has the unpleasant surprise of finding it with a backhoe.”

Progress

We weren’t sure if we were ever going to meet the mysterious individual Doc calls his “Rod Buster Buddy.” It’s monsoon season in the Ozarks so it’s been pouring rain for days.

But we came to work this Sunday morning and there they were… not just a single rod buster; a set of three.

Will & David Busting Rods

If you’re thinking you can’t figure out what they’re doing because the photo is blurry, well…. as usual, there are some weird goings on at Focker’s. This isn’t your usual footer ‘n slab foundation.

As residents of and visitors to Eureka Springs well know, the town is built on a site that is really only suitable for mountain goats. Directions here are never “left” or “right.” They are only “up” and “down.” So, if you see what looks like flatland, you know that it can only be fill… feet and feet of fill. Which is the case with the Fockerfoundation.

We did do a soil test to make sure it wasn’t fill over traditional materials like rusty bedrsprings and abandoned ‘42 Packards. But Kendra and Bill the structural engineer agreed that it would be tragic if Kendra, Kitty the Pink Focklift, and a triple-stacked pallet of Gatorade went sailing over the brink to where the actual ground is–20 feet below.

So we have to build a foundation that might as well be an overpass. Or, as Doc puts it, “You could land the space shuttle on this sucker!”

Here’s Connor doing rod-busting prep with the alien rod objects that David and Will are busting (in the foreground.)

Connor and... WTF?

They go in the ground. Vertically. Then they get filled with concrete. Imagine every chase scene you’ve ever seen in every action movie where The Bad Guy is chasing The Good Guy in a parking structure and The Good Guy dodges bullets by hiding behind concrete pillars. That’s what the foundation will look like, pretty much. An underground parking structure.

Tomorrow, all Hell breaks loose. Morrell Construction begins the re-construction of Shack v2.2. More rods will be busted. Jan’s truckload of electronics and housewares will be unloaded.

Let it roll….

…. the bitch fell off.

A happy Fockershopper with his new passenger

Fockershoppers are a famously resourceful bunch. This gentleman came to the store this morning to buy a vacuum cleaner for a friend and said, “Hoo boy! Oughta be a hoot to get it home on the bike.”

Natually, we all had to abandon the store (with camera in hand) to see how that went.

A few rope tricks and bungee cords later, he was ready to roll.

“Does your new biker babe have a name,” we asked?

“Yep,” he replied. “Hoover. She’s a sucky bitch.”

It’s not that nothing has been going on at the building site. It’s just that the paparazzi have been distracted.

While the three Big Fockers, Jan, Kendra & Kim, headed to Missouri to pack up the remains of a convenience/fishing/gardening store, several important steps happened.

Shea, Penny & Katie from Shewmaker painting took a bit of time out of their busy day to power wash the building that will become the back wall of Shack v2.2. Stephen the Electrician stopped by to remove the weird contraption/conduit art project that would have been in the way of Shewmaker Painting’s…painting. Until Stephen the Electrician removed it.

Doc, Stephen and Shannon from Morrell Construction have conducted several important summits involving much kicking of dirt, pointing to invisible structures, scheming and plotting.

Tomorrow, the Next Big Thing happens: First delivery of steel for the really big, egregiously engineered warehouse foundation.

It’s an overpass. Or as Doc says, “You’ll be able to land the Space Shuttle on it.” (Which we’d love to try. If only somebody would give us the top secret Space Shuttle booking number we’d be happy to call for a reservation.)

The only bad news is that, during the torturous 6-month crawl to the building permit, plywood prices nearly tripled. Supply and demand. It happens. Dammit.

Now we’re wondering if there’s a dark alley black market for plywood. If there is we’ll go there immediately.

Tripling prices just… kinda…make you want to rat up your hair, redden your eyes, pull up to the dark alley in a ‘62 Fairlane with lots of Bondo on the fenders… get a desperate expression on your face, whack the big veins at the bend of your elbow and whisper, hoarsely, “Hey, buddy. I just need a taste. Can you hook me up with some OSB? C’mon, man! I need it. Have some pity.”

Kendra has been shopping on line so, when I came in this morning, I had a little present on my desk.

“Every general contractor needs a hat,” said Kendra. And here it is, thoughtfully decorated with the official Wyoming buckin’ bronc:

All hat. No cattle. Got horse.

Matters of sartorial splendor dispatched, Slump Day proceeded as scheduled. Here’s Doc, Leroy and Lee working their magic:

Doc, Leroy & Lee

Lee and Leroy spent all day smoothing and fiddling. By the time the sun went down over Focker’s the foundation for Shack v2.2 was a thing of beauty:

Our new roller rink

Doc keeps talking about a mysterious individual that he calls his, “rod buster buddy.”

As Kendra’s youngest son Grant likes to say, “We don’t know what that means but you’d better take it back.”

But we think, maybe, “rod busting” has something to do with rebar. And, if that’s the case, how you say? Rod was busted today for the foundation under Shack v2.2.

Doc, Leroy & Chris... busted

It’s not quite a full-time job to keep up with the jargon. But it’s definitely a hobby.

We say “rebar.” Doc say “rod-bustin’.”

We say “big rocks.” Doc say “riprap.”

We say “big whirly-giggy-truck thing full of concrete.” Thompson Redi Mix calls it a “slump.”

Shack v2.2 foundation ready for the slump

Today we “bust.” Tomorrow, evidently, we “slump.”

Focker’s day began with a little surprise from Little Rock. We knew we were expecting a Caterpillar forklift. What we didn’t know was that Jan had asked Tom at Swift Forklift Services to paint the Cat in Kendra’s favorite color: pink.

“In all my twenty years in the business,” Tom said, “nobody has ever asked for a pink forklift.”

Go figure.

We immediately dubbed the new pink Cat “Kitty” and ran her off to the warehouse for a test spin.

Hello Kitty

Kitty quickly proved herself to be more maneuverable than our old friend Clark the Focklift. But, when Kitty balked and whined at the prospect of picking up a triple-stacked pallet of Alpo, Kendra pronounced her to be a “cranky little bitch that was acting her nails had just been painted.” (Which, in fact, they had.)

Meanwhile, back at the ranch….

Doc and Leroy prepared for the inaugural footer. And then, behold. It was poured.

Doc

Leroy

Giddy with excitement that construction had finally begun, everybody huddled up in the single patch of shade on the building site and commenced the ritual consumption of Budweiser, Crown Royal and Cabernet Sauvignon.

Michelle the Delifocker Raises a Toast

Next up: Adventures in Aromatherapy as Doc, Leroy and Little Apple rework the… shiver… grease trap.

Doc and Donny stopped by this afternoon to prepare for the first footer.

Alas, Kendra did not get to drive it

Doc tells us that there are several required parties that go along with any construction project. Since Doc is our Shaman, the Bearer of All Knowledge Involving Construction Customs and Rituals… we Believe.

We’ll be starting on the foundation under Shack v2.2, the new & improved shack, tomorrow. According to Shaman Doc, this is an event that requires the ritual sacrifice of beer.

Here’s where we ended up today:

Grand Canyon of the Fockers

OMG. We don’t have to drink the ritual beer out of the ditch… do we?

One of these days, we’ll get around to posting an illustrated essay about our move from the tiny little hut on Onyx Cave Road to our spacious new digs at 2100 E Van Buren. But today is not that day.

Why?

Because we’re off on yet another store expansion. We’re tired of unloading trucks like this:

Yo ho, heave ho.

Because it makes Kendra do this in the parking lot:

Focker down! Focker down!

Plus! You know how, when you come in to shop at Focker’s, how the right third of the store is blocked off, full of boxes stacked to the ceiling? And all you can hear from the right third of the store is the sound of rustling, thumping and people cursing? Every now and again, you hear Jean’s faint cries for help when she gets trapped atop a triple-stacked pallet of Gatorade?

We need to fix all that. We’re piling up housewares and clothing and tools and all kinds of stuff. We need a place to put it. So we’re building a warehouse out back.

As Granny Fanny Focker likes to say, “You have to break a few $1.75/dozen farm-fresh, free-range eggs to make an omelet.” Yep, we’re wreckin’ the place.

Here’s where we started:

The darkside - back of the building.

As of yesterday, all the exterior shacks are down, courtesy of Morrell Construction, and The Dons [cue theme from "The Godfather"] had started delivering fill dirt:

Shack down! Shack down!

The Dons dragged in a mountain of fill and sculpted it with their gigantic Tonka Toys. Alas, we missed The Don photo op on that one because we were… what? Unloading a truck out front. (Sigh.)

But, as of this evening, Doc the Concrete Guy was on site, scheming and plotting:

L-R: Don Tonka, Leroy, Doc

In tomorrow’s episode of Construction Porn, we’ll seek to answer two serious questions:

• Will Kendra the Focklift Driver get to drive the backhoe in exchange for her promise of Crown Royal?
• Does Donny, The Don (not to be confused with Don, The Don) ever wear a shirt?