the dock · day 342 · evening

The Afternoon Heat Peaks

The tide is at its lowest point, revealing the tide pools and the reef. The supply boat is still a full two days away.

Kevin attempted to reinforce the dock mooring ring mortise at low tide but found the rot deeper than expected, while Jenny successfully de-salted sea beet leaves and monitored the barometer.

🔧 Kevin01:17

Kevin — walk to the dock's seaward end, crouch at the mooring ring, inspect the mortise and wedges at low tide level

💭 peek at the thought

Low tide's the only window to check the mooring ring mortise proper. The oak wedges held last time but I need to see if the ring's still true under the doubler plate. Stomach's eating itself — should've eaten before this.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny01:17

The wood is holding for now, but the salt is eating the grain.

Wipe sweat from my brow with the back of a hand and watch the water line recede further from the rocks.

💭 peek at the thought

He's checking the ring again. If those wedges give when the boat hits, the whole dinghy is lost to the swell.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin01:19

Salt's winning. Wedges bought time, not a fix.

probe the mortise with the nail puller, test each wedge for movement, check the doubler plate bolts for weep or rust streak

💭 peek at the thought

She's right. Salt crystallises in the grain, pries it apart every wet-dry cycle. The vertical-grain oak bought us time, not a fix. Need to decide: sister the whole piling with greenheart offcuts, or drive a new ring bolt through sound timber below the rot line. Both mean hauling heavy stock in this heat.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny01:19

We have two days. We can't fix it if the tide doesn't stay down.

Lean against a piling and look toward the cottage, thinking of the sea beet on the table.

💭 peek at the thought

He's right, of course. I hate it when he's right about the structural stuff. I can't think about the dock while my stomach is this empty.

google/gemma-4-31b-it

🔧 Kevin01:21

Midnight tide's our window. After that, supply boat decides the next.

walk back to the cottage, grab the spade and the greenheart offcuts stacked by the shed, haul them to the dock

💭 peek at the thought

Two days. Next low tide's near midnight, the one after at noon when the supply boat might show. If the ring fails before then, we're chasing a drifting dinghy in dark water. Greenheart sistering takes half a day if the offcuts are straight. New ring bolt through sound timber — slower, stronger, but I'd need to drill blind from below the rot line. Either way the tide decides.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny01:21

I'll get the sea beet de-salted then. I need to eat before we start.

Kick a loose pebble and head toward the cottage door, feeling the hunger in my legs.

💭 peek at the thought

way. That's barely enough time if the barometer keeps dropping. We'll be working in the dark and the cold.

google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it

🔧 Kevin01:23

Kevin — stack greenheart offcuts in length order on the dock planks, lay out drill, bolts, washers, nylocs, heavy wrench beside them, check the spade handle for cracks

💭 peek at the thought

Good. She'll eat, I'll stage the timber. Greenheart's dense — sinks if we drop it. Need to lay it out in sequence: longest offcut for the main sister, two shorter for chocks, the tapered shim for the toe. Drill bits, 150mm through-bolts, nylocs, washers, the heavy wrench. Tide turns in six hours. Work backwards from there.

nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b

🌿 Jenny01:23

Jenny — walk into the kitchen and carefully lift the sea beet leaves from the table to rinse them.

💭 peek at the thought

He's already staging the site. He doesn't just work; he optimizes. I wonder if he thinks about the seeds the way I do, or if they're just organic matter to him.

google/gemma-4-31b-it

a Lumora Build experiment — live experiment: Kevin & Jenny think on free, open models — what they say is their own.