CNSTRCTN, XIX #1 Food and Finding Helps

Memories, like birds, fleeting.  They must be grasped and held in heart's hands.

We'll stay inside this week.  Let's go eat first.
The new cafeteria accommodates two lines at once.
Still has a few snags, but that's to be expected when
you're serving close to 300 in each of the two lunch
periods.  Seen here are the girls going through and
making their choices.  The equipment is new, as you can see, and so are the trays, now with sections! (What will they think of next?)

Lines are long with only two lunch periods instead of three.  Looks like someone has come in and saved a place before getting into the line.

Let's move around a bit and see the smart looking signage, but let's eat first.  To Longshore...

Moving out of Longshore Dining Hall and going back into the foyer via the Srs. of Notre Dame/ Student Commons doors, we'll turn right  Looking we see Hilton Hall. Think of this as a "street" sign with some "houses" along this street.

                                                                                          

 
One more sign will wrap up the day.                       

If the order seems strange, achieving it had made blogger a bit (more) strange.  Some things are more demanding of one's mental stability.
God bless you and yours this coming week.  Blogger will keep searching for ways to skinny into the next unexplored area.  Enough.

CNSTRCTN Vol. XVIII, #3 Encouraging Vistas

Memories, like birds, fleeting.  They must be grasped and held in heart's hands.

Now that the major renovations in the main building are completed, we can take a look at a few things new at the chapel end.  The road back to the faculty parking lot was in great need of repair after all the daily use by the construction machines.
      Can you see five men in the first pic?  Blogger threw in the second pic. so that you could see the roller ready to do its thing.  Can you see five men in this pic?

The next two pictures are inside the chapel, of course, the lower one may be familiar to you, but you may not have seen the board placed in the center.  Blogger thinks that it will hold the fixtures for attaching the cross to the surface of the final altar piece.  The upper pic. shows some advancement in the back part of chapel which will become the reflection space.  What's notable in this shot which you haven't seen before is the lit passageway from the elevator to the 1 1/2 level.  (The next two half floor levels do not have that configuration for getting into the hallways, but each has a slightly different design ((if that makes sense)).)  (Blogger doesn't know  you're seeing, but every time she looks at this photo, the column on the right looks like it's leaning.  It isn't--just to reassure you!)

We'll move back outside again to check on a key component to the entrances to the north end of the building.  This pic. was taken the day before the blacktop job was begun, you will notice.  It is outside the entrance to the president's suite.

                                       
A good place to end for this week's report.  We are hoping that the momentum we are seeing in these will continue at its recent speed.
Tune in for the further adventures, hopefully, needless to say.  Be good to yourself so that you can be your best self--God uses our dispositions for His purposes.  Amen!

CNSTRCTN Vol. XVII #1 Keeping Step with Time Marching

Memories like birds, fleeting.  They must be grasped and held in heart's hands.

Things are still busy in a few areas of the school.  Looking at the tower, we see two men (same two for the tower top project, it seems) up in their basket lift, prepping the top for finishing.  This is true of the second photo, but in that, blogger wants to demonstrate the risks these men take--climbing out of the basket and stepping higher.

Moving down into chapel area which is awaiting many finishing touches.   The first photo shows that the windows have been installed in the tower area and the west windows of the chapel.  The second photo shows the prep for the stained glass windows' return, with the grooves in the frame work waiting for the glass itself.
                             
 The first photo shows that the windows have been installed in the tower area and the west windows of the chapel.  The second photo shows the prep for the stained glass windows' return, with the grooves in the frame work
waiting for the glass itself.
                                                        
  In the next photo, you get a look at the back of the supports for the sanctuary background (you've seen the front of the whole array of supports previously). In the final photo you can get a hint of work that still must be accomplished in the chapel.  Recall that this area was almost untouched during the summer while the men were, blogger is supposing, working elsewhere on some other project.  Now that those areas may not be available or maybe finished, they are back with this contract.   The last photo from chapel gives a hint of much work ahead.

The last two shots give a definite feeling that the kitchen will soon be functioning (word is out that it should be ready before the end of this week).
                         
Look closely at the photo on the left and you will see that the tile is in two different patterns and colors (side and  back walls).  The students will no doubt notice.  One student told blogger the other day that she is so impressed with the color introduced in the cafeteria, suggesting that it seems to bring the room into the 21st. century.  It brought to blogger's mind the cafeteria at 5th. Street, and how hard the Sisters worked to make it warm and pleasant, even thought it was a basement room with high windows and low ceiling.
As time marches on this week, blogger may be able to spot other new things to share with you.  Until she can, aufwiedersehen.  God bless, and keep looking to spot God's hidden marvels.

CONSTRCTN Vol. XVI, #4 Limited, but Heartening

Memories, like birds, fleeting.  One must grasp and hold in heart's hands.

Slim week in terms of photos, but here's a look at what's been happening in chapel.  The support for the background in the sanctuary (looks like a series of pipes (?)) on which the large forked crucifix will hang.  Looking at the front of the chapel building facing the succor field, you will see the silhouette of that cross.  More about that later.  The other photo gives you an hint of what the west wall of the chapel will look like, i.e. windows, so what what the second photo gives you is a tantalizing look at the frames.  One's imagination could go wild with this (but exercise due control, please).  By the way, the closing of that open area onto the chapel floor makes it impossible to move large vehicular pieces of equipment back onto the floor of the chapel.  Progress!  You can see in both photos that the walls are painted already.  Things seem to be accomplished in strange order, night war (German)?

    

The top row of the window frames, blogger noticed this morning, has been filled with what looks like a sort of smokey glass--that was from a distance, however.

Blogger regrets not being able to show you more, but the week has been hectic.  The other area of interest has that has also enjoyed some progress, blogger did not have time to investigate and report to you.  It happens.

Next week, vacation, really.  The first in three years for a few of us, so we are excited.  Blogger will include a short report on her return.  Needless to say, there will be no posting next week.  Dry your eyes, be good, and pray for us as we do for you.  Bon voyage to us!

CNSTRCTN Vol. XVI, # 3 Some New Views

Memories, like birds, fleeting.  One must grasp and hold in heart's hands.

Let's start in the CLC.  One photo shows the outside door, obviously not to be used yet, and the other photo shows girls working at two of the work stations.  One student one seems to be saying, "We are working.
 
Looking again at the not-to-be-used-yet door, you can see beyond it a small plaza.  What will appear out there, since it is accessible from the road, remains something all of us can eagerly anticipate.  Stay tuned.

Before leaving the first floor, we'll look out a higher window to see a kitchen vent coming in.  Blogger has watched many such little dramas, and is impressed at how careful the placement must be and how the workmen work at getting the object secured.  She has seen this so often in the many sites of the renovation/construction process.                                                                                  
                                         
Let's go up for the two final shots of this issue of CONSTRUCTION.  We are inside looking out of the two fellows on the basket lift (hope that a close if not correct designation) to where the tower is finally getting a finished look.
 

In the first taken through a screen (no, it's not your eyes, nor is it the iPad).  The men have finished applying one side of the upper section while they are getting a measurement or something from around the corner.  In the second shot, the man on the right is up on a rung of the basket, while the other waits for him to finish securing the last panel before giving him the next.  You'll notice that both men are wearing tethering harnesses.  One can see, blogger thinks, why such precautions are needed. As she was watching, she could imagine how easy it would be to test the system here, and hopes the men will never really need it.  It's an OSHA thing, and smart.  The panels, by the way, are a fresh version of the color of the outside of the 4th. floor siding.  That is probably faded in 68 years of sun and weather exposure.  Each panel here looks to be about 15-18" wide and links into the last panel.

Blogger will have more at the end of the week, and will post nothing in the first week of October (vacation with a few of her confreres).  Until we meet again in this spot, blogger wishes you
au revoir, and besides that, God's blessings.

CNSTRCTN Vol. XVI, # 1 Let's Ride

Memories, like birds, fleeting.  One must grasp and hold in heart's hands.

First, one last look at some aspects of the building of the Spanish steps--after all, it isn't often that one can see such an architectural, to say nothing of engineering, structure in process of coming to completion.  So here are two early and one at the finish.

    

                                         

Going up to 2 1/2 level and looking in on three religion teachers, two teaching (we're looking through windows with these first two, and one waiting for her class to arrive):


Looking closely at the first photo reveals a door near        
the reflection of the outside window on the left wall. This door at the end of the folding doors, leads into the next room.   Looking through the door window of the next room, you can see above the teacher the projector on the wall. Little touches of home are comfortable in the blue walled room.
                                                                 

    

Moving back down to the first floor and the one of the cafeteria's new features--the charging station with two printers:
                                                       
So back in the saddle again, back where friends are friends (older readers and not so old may recognize the sentiment in the old Gene Autry song).  The school day hums along while all of us  accustom ourselves to the sound of the new beginning/end of classes signals.  Quite mod, of course.
Next time: more looks around the school and maybe some reactions to the new.  Until then with all in God's loving care.
Blogger

CNSTRCTN Vol. XIV, #4, Oh, the Pain of It!

Memories, like birds, fleeting.  They must be grasped and held in heart's hands.

                                         An Ode to the Fall of Summer

Oh, the bitter fall of summer,It comes, alas, too soon.

                             

                                                                                                           

The students come so slowly,
       And moan to friends so missed;
              their gait, now slowed and stumbling
                      A longer summer kissed...
                                                                 goodbye.

And so goodbye to summer
         In the waning of the moon.
            .             
                                             
                    They think not much of studies,
                            Consider not the boon.

                                          

Ah, youth so soon, so fleeting,
        So, oh what can we say?
                They'll labor on for months now
                        And think that that's the pay.
                                                                   
                        

                            But youth knows not the benefits
                                    Of learned labor's boon.
                                             The teachers know that in the end,
                                                      The students sing a happier tune!!!!!!!

And so they do, and often in between.  The beginning of the day was just as you saw it above, and the adults agreed!
Next week will bring the places and things the girls saw on their first day.  Stay tuned!