Frustration

12/7/10 Tuesday
It’s a rough morning. Cherie is fighting off depression stemming from not having a bathroom. I don’t have any magic words to say and we aren’t seeing much hope of help from the plumber. I wish we had the money to pay him or someone, anyone. She made it off to work unhappy and not as clean as she would like to be. We have friends in Midland who have offered their shower but that’s a twenty mile drive away and is real awkward when you think about it. We’re up at 5:30 in the morning to start getting ready for her to leave for work by 7:30. I can’t imagine putting someone out like that. Add the half hour driving time and it makes it even worse.

I started doing stuff for the bathroom but when I started trying to figure out and understand what to do, and what not to do, trying to order my thoughts, it triggered a slow down. Just talked to Cherie on the phone and she could hear it right away. I’m looking at all this stuff and am lost. Tilted the tub over to see if it needs anything underneath it for the install. Don’t have a clue. The plumber, who showed up, looked, and left saying I had all the wrong parts, said I need to build a two by four frame for where the pipes go and to hold the tub. Ok, how do I do that? He also said I need to cut a hole in the floor so he could get at the pipes and stuff. I can do that but don’t really want to unless I know he is coming. So far he hasn’t come when he said he would. Not anxious to have a big hole in the floor that rats can enter through or that our cats will crawl under the house through. I might be able to cut it and leave the wood there as a removable hatch.

I want to put the hardy board stuff down on the floor, but am unsure what to do around the toilet. We want to move the toilet slightly, face it in another direction. Should I remove the toilet and lay the board, cutting a hole where it flushes through? Right now the toilet is the only thing working and we’re anxious to keep it that way. However it is no longer stable on the floor and the water pipe feeding to it is now leaking a little.

So I’m working on removing the window. I’m not going to take it all the way out just yet, just removing all the trim pieces around the outside. I’m thinking this job I can do by myself so will carefully move forward on it. I would like to put up drywall but can’t handle the pieces by myself. Perhaps I can do the areas that require small pieces. I should be able to measure and cut them outside and carry the smaller piece in by myself. At least then something is happening. I’ll scrape the old adhesive stuff left on the floor from the old linoleum floor we removed.

Have a Kairos committee meeting this afternoon. Don’t really want to go but we need drinking water and the widow called and needs help so it works out. Just doesn’t help me when it comes to getting anything done here. Have an earache that is coming on with a vengeance. Figures.
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It was a bad slow down. Lasted most of this day. Went to the Kairos meeting and people asked if I was ok because they could tell something was wrong. It's embarrassing to me to go out when like this but the Kairos is important. I don't really remember what they talked about. Went to the widows house after and fixed her lift chair. She couldn't tell I was slow. Really nasty ear ache as well. Turned into a crappy day, but I woke up so it's a good day no matter how bad it seems. still slow. Writing this is a challenge.