Poof !

On Friday morning, I had both a load up to Chicago (which had already been loaded into the trailer on Thursday in Sylvester, GA) ... and a load back.

At 10:30 a.m. this morning when Dan called me (I was on I-65 by Culman, AL headed north) ... There was no longer a return trip load. That means that out of 4 trucks, only 1 had a complete roadtrip of loads ... 2 trucks are sitting idle all week ... and I will be vacationing in Chicago this week ... waiting for some kind of load or combination of loads that will get me back home again. Without wasting all of Dan's fuel money ...

My wife declared to me that I am going to go out and get a different job ... just as soon as I get home.
The foto is Sienna on a hammock.

Didn't get it done ...

This week I didn't get anything done on the trikes. I didn't get the birdhouse even started ... although I do have plans for it. The gardenbox did get created and planted. We spent at least one day on Real Estate. There was another visit to the dentist ... And we did finally manage to get the swimming pool open.

There was a cover over the pool ... to keep junk out during the winter ... it collected water from the rains, leaves from the trees, along with bugs and polliwogs. We spent a good while at midday using buckets to remove all that stuff from on top the cover. Then brushing it all to one end so we could bucket it out and toss it over the fence. My clothes were soaked with perspiration. I had to go lay down for an hour nap.

Now that the invisible muscles on my ribs aren't hurting so much ... I noticed that the ones in my thighs were kind of sore ... and of course, the shoulder is still sore. We won't talk about slight dizzy sensations when laying down. And sleepy sensations when only driving for 4-5 hrs. I really don't want to go get checked for blood sugar or blood pressure ... oh, well. This getting older stuff ... ugh ... gives me a better understanding for my Dad. I still want to do all the things that I did when I was 20, because I still feel that way inside, but I just don't have the energy for it.

Job Offer ??

The broker that my wife works with ... offered to pay for the schooling if I would take it and pass the Real Estate exam.

Daniel can't afford to drive his cab-over truck any more ... and if any more weeks like this one crop up ... he and I may be looking for a new source of income.

Planted a white eggplant and a bell pepper in the garden this afternoon.

the Gardenbox is in !!

Don't let the smile in this foto fool you ... I'm really "too pooped to pop!"

It took a good 6 hours to tear the grass out, get the 4' x 8' box in, and mix the soil with compost and peat moss.

My wife surfed on the computer to discover that the tree out front is a native species of Black Cherry ... the fruits are only 1/4"-1/3" in diameter. Slight tart taste, but excellent flavor. Good for jam and pies.

I found lots of melted and broken car safety glass ... and charred wood remains. Daniel says that Paul used to have a wooden shop over in this area ... and a fellow had his Jeep parked next to the shop, when the shop burned down. Hence the broken and melted car parts. This led to the building of the big old barn shop on the other side of Paul's place.

My wife wants to drive down to the beach and watch the sunset over the ocean ... I want to turn on an air conditioner and collapse for the rest of the day ... it's going to take a lot more than 2 aspirin to get me up and moving tomorrow ... :-)

Memorial Holiday

This rather smiley fellow dropped by for a visit yesterday ... I believe he was attempting to get out of the middle of the wedding preparations for one of his wife's relatives.

He worked on setting up a DVD player on an XP computer that my wife has ... After working on my Apple eMac ... I was astounded at how difficult it still was to work with Windows machines ... The hardware was installed, DVD player software was downloaded (3 or 4 different ones), and still it wouldn't play. Seems we had to find the correct Decoder ... I will attempt to download and run one today to see if it will finally work.

In honor of Memorial Day, we went out to the cemetery to put plastic flowers on graves.

My wife said that "we" need to make a garden box ... so, the other foto is of a wooden garden box which I made to her specifications ... out of whatever lumber was the cheapest ... (it is currently upside down). I need to cut out the sod from that location ... hammer the legs down into the ground ... and mix in some compost and peat moss with the sandy soil. I'll show it again when it is finally done and has some plants in it. That dark object in front of it is a stump ... that I was using as a chopping block ...