Slow getting up

12/27/06 Wednesday
We were slow getting up this morning, slept in till a little after 8:00. I turned on the TV as that helps Cherie unfog in the morning and we watched about Gerald Ford’s death and ultimately his life. I went ahead and cooked bacon and eggs for me as Cherie only wanted cereal or oatmeal. I took some food out to Skittles as he finally ate what I’d put out before. I guess he hasn’t caught any birds or rats lately. The fact that I’ve been clearing out the bus and wrecked the pack rat nests probably contributed to that.

It will get almost up to seventy degrees today so will be wonderfully warm. The rest of the week doesn’t look bad either with temps running in the high fifties. There may be some rain but that is always a big if.

This morning I am running at my average of 7 on the bob scale. We are hoping my check will come Friday as the first falls on Sunday. If it does we will go into Midland to stock up on essentials. Then we can buy some stamps and mail off the rest of the Christmas cards we have. I’m sure the receivers will understand or at least I hope. Hey, you run out of stamps and money you do the best you can. No apologies here.

We hope to finish painting the back room. That is no problem. I also plan to make a saw guide jig correctly this time so I can get Cherie’s sewing cabinet done. With the back room finished we can get her sewing area fixed up the way she needs it. If the check comes Friday I can put gas in the truck so we can take the loads of laundry that have built up into Midland. We will hit Home Depot where we will use the gift cards to get the caulk needed to seal up the space between the drywall and floors, thus making it harder for scorpions to find their way in. What else we do with the gift cards we haven’t decided yet but will spend it carefully. The cheapest hot water heater we found was around $220 so the gift cards only cover half of that. The first of the year brings bills that only come up then such as the farm insurance. Add to that our need to get car insurance in Texas and other things it will be a tight month.

I also would like to finish clearing out the bus. That is a nasty job that I will be glad to finish. The dumpster is empty and Sunday is the end of the month so it’s our last chance to fill it. I think I will haul everything off the bus and then pick what I can’t burn to fill the dumpster with. It’ll leave an ugly pile of crap visible to all who drive by but hopefully they will understand we’re fixing up the place and aren’t the Beverly Hillbillies. Who knows. I suppose I shouldn’t care what people think but I do. There was a time I didn’t but times change don’t they.

I need to take my medicine and an aspirin to thin my blood. Good for the heart you know. Then I’ll get to work so see ya later.

Well we never painted the back room. I was doing a see saw thing with the petite seizures and then it settled out with me running a five on the bob scale. I worked on making another saw guide jig, carefully measuring and taking my time to get it right. Despite that when it came to make the first cut on it I measured again and the line I had drawn was a half inch off. Figures. At least it was correctable. I finally got it done and it seems to be correct so that’s a relief.

By then I was moving slow. Cherie had looked out the window and came out, telling me she could tell I wasn’t doing well by the way I walked. A headache was coming on by then also. She fixed some coffee and made a great lunch with cornbread and the last of the beans.

There was a nice breeze coming from the west so I decided it would be a good time work on the bus as it would come straight through giving me some fresh air.

(Gotta take a break cause Cherie just brought me some asiago cheese chicken sausage with macaroni and cheese for dinner. We got the sausage at Sam’s Club around thanksgiving when we went during their food samples marathon. That was our dinner that night. I am so spoiled)

Anyway, with shovel loads of the thirty year accumulation of rat shit fresh air is good. It’s a shame this was allowed to happen. Sorry about the picture but it’s all part of sharing our lives, the good with the bad.

Cherie came out and took a bunch of pictures. This is nothing yet. Tomorrow I’ll take a picture of the piles of stuff I threw out of the bus. This was after several days and several dumpster loads and there was still this much left. If the wind is right I’m going to have another bonfire. If it’s not it’ll be an ugly pile till it is.


I’ll fill the dumpster one last time. I collected two boxes of canning jars out of the hundred or so jars found in every nook and cranny. Most of this stuff should have been thrown in the dumpster instead of loaded on this bus. Minnie Lee could well have insisted it be saved but there were probably fifty old plastic milk jugs that were so old they just crumbled away. That and loads of clothes and cloth. The house had been full of clothes also.

Tomorrow I plan to get the hose and wash out the inside of the bus. Then I will see if I can get it to run. Not tomorrow I won’t, just over the months to come. If I can I’ll try to get it to move. The sand has piled up to the bottom of the rims so that may not happen even if I do get this motor to run. That will be a challenge in itself as it has sat for thirty years. The bus was bought in 1982 to move my mother down from Chicago when she had cancer for the second or third time. It is a 1972 Ford. Still don’t know what to do with the thing.

Anyway I finally got done. Coming into the house I stripped down in the office and the clothes went straight into the laundry bin. Cherie had already heated some water so I could wash my hair and bath. I first sucked water up each nostril to wash the nasty dust out of them. I know that sounds rough but it’s what I did. I know I should be wearing a dust mask but I get going and don’t take the time to do so.

That was it for my day. I don’t know what Cherie did but I know she stayed busy. She did call Paula with the Farm Bureau. Cherie asked about their payment plan for the insurance and got us enrolled. That will help our finances immensely. Paula has still not heard about the car insurance cause the underwriter has a staff infection so we will keep our Ohio policy for now. Paula went and looked at the blog while we were talking and thought it was a great thing. Maybe she will join the growing audience we have. Don’t know. It’s 8:00 now and I will call it a day. Goodnight folks.