Bridge Work

Looks like they may be done with the new bridge in a week or so. I come home that way, because the crew is usually gone for the day and the ford is open. They dug the two approaches, last week, down to the road bed, which seems to be good sized cobbles (the size of your two fists together) in a matrix of asphalt. Never seen anything quite like it. Then they compacted a layer of gravel on top. Next will be the finish layer of asphalt. The structure is pure function. Two formed abutments of about 15 cubic yards of concrete each, anchored to bed rock with significant re-bar, steel i-beams spaced very close together, and a layer of corrugated steel, I don't know what that's called, that serves as a substrate for concrete. Looks like they're about ready for the finish surface. It's massively overbuilt, which was the point, so that it could carry log trucks, and it's short enough that all the axles couldn't come to bear at the same time. I don't know what they're going to do with the old bridge down at Turkey Creek, but it's a much bigger deal. They have it shut down to one lane now, and they might keep it, as a pedestrian bridge, and build a new vehicular bridge next to it. Make no mistake, the county road department rules. My understanding is that they (whoever they are) want to log some sections down Lamp Black Road and the bridges weren't up to the traffic. I'm sure some money changed hands. Every nefarious thing you can imagine is true. The body politic. I don't have a vested interest in this, I just need to know the way to come and go. I had to go to town today, as I had foolishly forgotten to buy whiskey in my haste to get home on Saturday, and I needed cigaret papers and a new lighter. This is all testament to how tired I was. Went to the museum and watched a couple of things on Hulu, did go to the pub for a pint of beer and bowl of stew, and talked with Barb for a while. She was at the opening and said that the turn-out was terrible. I don't know what's to be done about that. An extremely rural section of southern Ohio, and the interest in art is nearly nil. It's like beating your head against a wall. We curate great shows, and we treat them with all respect, in a lovely building; put out newsletters, have a great web-site, go on the radio, get written up in the papers, and we still can't draw an audience.