Home again....

The title of this post could mean two things....

We are home again, after taking our Thanksgiving cabin retreat trip.

Or, after being forced out of the trip last year by a clerical error at the front desk, returning to our rented cabin this year, and getting our favorite cabin after many years of not being able to reserve it, was like going home again.

It truly was.... even though the couch was broken, so that sitting on it to watch the fire was a challenge, with pillows and blankets piled onto the broken end.

Even though the counter top is now badly damaged, with a big piece of tape across the formica. 

Even though some of the wood blinds in the windows have been trashed by other guests.  

Even though the table on the screened in porch is no longer usable.  Even though the chairs on the screened in porch were gone.....

I set up my candles, and hung fabric over the tv and the windows, and used a table cloth on the counter...so it was easy to hide some of the unpleasantness. 

It's a sad state of affairs that the cabins have been allowed to fall into some disrepair... HOWEVER, it appears that they are renovating and upgrading bit by bit.

We had a new stove, but still the same noisy fridge that was there the last time we had that cabin several years ago.  We complained about it then, and it has not been changed or fixed.  Thankfully, it still works.

It does seem that the cabins are under new management, though.

There were decorative autumn displays here and there, with hay bales, pumpkins, and mums.  There were winter holiday decorations here and there, as well.  There's never been anything like that before.

The little shop at the marina is now apparently open year round (instead of closed up tight for the winter by the time we usually go).  I'm thinking it is privately operated, not part of the state park.

One can get firewood, and snacks, etc.  We didn't go check it out, but there was a sign in the cabin about it.

There were lots of souvenirs for sale in the office, too....  so it was much different in that way.

Down the way, one of the cabins was being renovated inside, so that gives us hope that, by next year, #13 will have been fixed up a bit.   

....IF we are able to reserve it.  

They've changed the rules... you can no longer reserve a cabin as you check out.  You have to wait a month, and can only reserve 11 months in advance.  

SO, on Christmas Eve, which is exactly 11 months before our next desired check in, we will go on line and try to book it.

Anyway.... we got to peek inside of #14, which we have never stayed in.  It was in MUCH better shape inside.... no damaged blinds, the couch wasn't broken.  It also has a "real" fireplace...not an insert.

Rather than a breakfast bar/counter that sticks out into the main room, it has a table off to the side, to the main room seems bigger, and is definitely more open. 

It has a new stove, a newer fridge, and a newer shower stall, and a blow dryer.  

It's like #13, in that it has a screened in porch, with a slightly different view of the lake, but we don't like that it is located at the coming together of two roads.  

One of the chairs that used to be on the porch of #13 is now on the porch of #14, but only one.  The other one probably rotted, and had to be thrown out.

Another touch was the brand new little lights (solar maybe?  They were VERY bright, though) along the steps up to the porch, which would help a lot after going out star gazing.

#13 is "our" cabin.... but we discussed that we might switch to #14 in coming years, as we get older.  The parking spot for #14 is right near the door, making loading in and out MUCH easier than it is in #13, where the parking spot is up a bit of an incline, around BEHIND the cabin.  

We did a little snooping on Thanksgiving, too, peeking into unoccupied cabins.  

One of them, with a forest view, has brand new resin rocking chairs on its porch.... definitely a better idea than the cheap wood and particle board furniture we had that is not at all weather proof.

The usual family groups weren't there this year.  I am thinking that is because of COVID.  

There are usually at least two big groups who rent multiple cabins and celebrate Thanksgiving together, carrying hot food back and forth between cabins, and having big bonfires at night where everyone has a camp chair in a big circle.

I missed seeing that activity, but I am also glad they weren't there, endangering each other. 

Several of the cabins were empty, but there were still lots of people there, so we did most of our hiking "off trail," following deer paths.

The campground had a lot more campers than usual, including some tent campers, which we have never seen before. 

I got up each morning around sunrise, and went out onto the porch, or out for a walk, while the coffee brewed.  

The first morning, there were 7 female white tail deer right down the way from our cabin.  They didn't seem to mind me.  One of them was very small, clearly born this year.

The next morning, there were 5, right outside of our porch, and  yesterday, a young (4 point) buck.

Sighting the deer, and hiking along their hidden paths, was highly significant for me. It did my spirit a lot of good.

For some reason, the birds were not as numerous as usual.  Only saw one sapsucker, and a few juncos, chickadees, and titmice.

There is usually a LOT more "little" bird watching to be done.

We took 5 bundles of firewood with us, and enjoyed our fireplace each night.  Dave even learned how to lay and tend a fire on our last night!  He's never done that before, and had not built a fire since he was in boy scouts.

We rented a mid-size SUV for this trip, because we had planned to take the telescope, two guitars, and had to take all of our dishes, pots, and pans due to COVID.

It ended up not being big enough, so the telescope, and one of the guitars, stayed at home.

Next year, if we just don't plan to take those large items, AND if we don't have to take a bin with all of our own utensils, we might not have to rent a vehicle.  We'll see.  My car has a pretty big cargo area if you fold the back seats down.

Another thought is maybe we can wait, and buy our firewood once we get there.  There seemed to be a lot more availability here and there near the park.  NOT having to find space for that in the car would help tremendously with the loading of the car!

SO, we are already unpacked, and the laundry is already done. Today will be about getting groceries ordered for the week, and preparing ourselves, mentally, for a return to the doldrums.

I am going to make a batch of chicken broth, and make something warming for dinner.  It's chilly and damp here, with a cold weather week ahead.

I have a meeting with my class at 11 am.

My next week is busy with appointments... Monday is back to the injury doc, Tuesday is my injection, and port flush, at the oncology clinic, and Wednesday is my first injury physical therapy appointment.  Hoping it will help my neck and upper back discomfort at long last.

I hope that my numerous and gentle readers had a lovely holiday, and that you enjoy your week.

Thanksgiving is next week!

 After a week of trying to get a bit more back to normal, it's now time to really work on getting ready for our cabin trip.

We have confirmed that we will need to rent a larger vehicle.  Dave sold his big car a year and a half ago, and my car isn't quite up to the task, now that we have a telescope, and are taking guitars (which we don't usually do), and all of the pots, pans, dishes, etc., that we are going to need.

Our best option, my idea, looked like it was going to be a UHaul van, because they quoted us $80 for the rental.  

HOWEVER, when Dave went to confirm it, suddenly there was $200 more in charges.

He had previously looked at renting a sport utility vehicle from Enterprise, and that was going to be $230.  

We thought that was a bit too much, so that was why we looked at UHaul.. HAHA!

Dave can use his company discount at Enterprise, too, so it will be less than that.  Yes, he confirmed that with his boss.

SO that's lined up.  

Also, since neither of us is working in our offices, we don't have the usual luxury of bringing home copy paper boxes to pack our stuff in, so we bought a couple of smallish plastic bins, and will use paper grocery bags for any overflow, and all of the non-refrigerated food items.

Unfortunately, my usual practice of purchasing a turkey breast around Halloween, and dropping it into the deep freeze,  was stolen from me by the massive power outage.

Even IF I had already purchased it, we would have lost it when all of our food rotted.

We went out grocery shopping Friday night (I didn't want anyone else picking out my menu items for this holiday), and there were literally NO turkey breasts left, but there were hundreds of whole turkeys.

I was not about to drive all over town looking for a turkey breast, so, I grabbed two Cornish hens, which were my back up plan. They were the LAST TWO.

It seems, at least locally, that people are opting for smaller gatherings for this holiday, like the CDC is recommending.

Anyway, when we went around the end of the big open freezer case,  I found a small, "freezer to oven" boneless turkey breast by "Butterball" brand.

Hmmm...

The options juggled around in my head for a minute, and I settled on the boneless turkey.  It will bake faster, and there will be less mess, and just enough left overs.

Since we have to pack in EVERYTHING we will need for cooking, eating, and drinking, the simpler, the better.

Fortunately, the park IS still providing towels, and those prepacked kits of coffee and cream/sugar.

This weekend, I am making my check lists, and dropping things into the plastic bins as I think of them.

We have done this trip so many times that this part is easy now.  We just need to keep in mind that we have to bring the whisk, and the measuring spoons, etc. etc.

This morning, we are off to Costco one last time before the holidays.  I found a couple of possible gift items in their catalog, and we don't want to have to go again before the end of December, because there will be too many people there.

Oklahoma is still experiencing the highest COVID numbers yet, and we are going into personal lock down.

Have a good Sunday, gentle readers, and stay safe and healthy.  I hope that you are finding ways to celebrate the holiday next week with kindness to yourselves, and with respect for the new limitations on our lives.

I've had enough of bad luck! (LONG post)

During of the week of our vacation, they started including a possible rain storm- that could turn to ice- in the extended forecast, for the week before Halloween.

As the days passed, the forecast got a little clearer...it looked like we could be in for a very early ice storm, but it didn't look like it would be bad.

It wasn't until the day of my last blog post that they started really scaring us.  

The storm was being predicted to start early Monday morning, October 26th, and could go as long as Wednesday.  

It would come in three waves of freezing rain, most of it over about 48 hours, dumping a potential 1 inch of ice glaze onto overheard power lines, and trees...which were still FULL OF GREEN LEAVES.

1 full inch of ice, on everything overhead.  That is a LOT of ice...record breaking amounts of ice, and ice is very heavy.

The roads weren't likely to freeze up, because the ground is still warm, but there would be a lot of water on the roads, because this would be a flooding rain, with temperatures at -or just below- freezing.

The sleet started shortly after we clocked in to work on Monday morning.  We watched it starting to accumulate on our willow tree out front, and on the power lines, and pergola, in the back.  The pecan tree was starting to sag a bit, too.

Before noon, the branches started to break off of the neighbors' sweetgum tree, onto our driveway.

And then, after I clocked back in after my lunch, the cable line broke away from the house, and fell to the ground, as Dave was cutting the pecan branch that was pulling on it.  Oops.  

No more internet, thus no more work for either of us.

Dave called the cable company, and they said they could fix it the next day.  I texted my boss, because I couldn't get a call to go through for some reason.

Then, the power went out.  

Dave immediately got the suitcase down, and we packed a "go bag."

After waiting for about 3 hours, he called and got a room for us at a local hotel a few miles away.

He went out and dragged the extremely heavy, ice-encrusted branches off of the driveway, we fed the cats, tossed the go bag in the car, and we left the house--dark, and getting colder, to have a warm place to sleep.

We got fast food burgers, and settled in at the hotel for the night.  The news was all about this terrible ice storm, and why it was happening.

All of those leaves.... ice so early in the season would be devastating. Literally. 

They began to call this a catastrophic ice storm.

I texted my boss again and told her that our cable would be repaired the next day, when Dave got an update from the cable company saying that our appointment had been canceled.

SO, he called again, and, as it turned out, someone had been in our area while we were at the hotel in the late afternoon, and had already fixed the cable line.

What a stroke of luck that turned out to be, which will become clear later in this long post.

We settled in to sleep, as the temperature dropped into the mid 20s, and the wind picked up.  The ice was pelting, and coating, the window of our hotel room as we tried to rest.

Tuesday morning, I showered, and Dave went to check on the house, leaving me to wait in the room.  I really wanted to go home, but he thought it better that he go check things first, thinking we might be in the hotel for a couple of days.

Surprisingly, the power was ON at our house, but he thought we'd better stay at the hotel anyway, so he texted and had me extend our stay another night.

I texted my boss again, letting her know that I was going to stay at the hotel.  Her power was out, too, as was most everyone else's.

Then, as soon as I finished that phone call to the front desk, the hotel's power went out.

I called back down and said "never mind, we'll be leaving," and packed up all of our things.  

Dave wasn't answering texts, so I knew he was driving back to hunker down.  As it turned out, he was, instead, coming to get me, to take me back to our house.

When we got home, I saw that our driveway was completely blocked by piles of downed sweetgum.  It was a very good thing that Dave had us escape to the room when he did, or we would have been trapped in the house for many days.

Our neighbors let us park the car in their driveway, which was also blocked by our crepe myrtle.  (Other times, we parked in the street, and prayed that no one would come careening along on the slick pavement and slam into my car!)

I did a load of laundry, thinking I'd better do it while we had power, and I gathered up candles, and trimmed their wicks, and placed them around the house.  

The cats were fine,  not showing any signs of discomfort, and sleeping their day away. 

I made dinner, and as Dave was cleaning up, putting stuff into the disposal to run it, the power flashed off and on again, and then...it went out for good and all.

No electricity meant no internet via the restored cable line, not even any WiFi on our phones, and no heat, and no hot water.

Power lines, cable lines, and cell phone towers, were down all over town.   As it turned out, our entire NW side of town eventually had no cable, even for those who had power and lines that were in tact.

A large limb of our pecan broke and fell, and took out the neighbors' cable line.  

It would be another 2 weeks before it could be repaired, because as things got worse, the cable company was not able to keep up with repairs......thus my comment earlier about our line being put back up on Monday!

In the end, 440,000 customers were without power.  Our area was the first to go out, and the last to be repaired.

The block across from the street from us never lost power, though.... which happens every time.  We do NOT understand this!  Unfortunately, the whole time, no one from that side of the street ever approached us to see if they could help, or offered us a shower or a warm meal.  I felt weird about going and knocking on a stranger's door, so we didn't. 

We got the down comforter out of the closet, gave thanks that we hadn't yet donated it (because we NEVER use it), and slept as branches crashed to the ground all around the neighborhood.

On Wednesday, I got up and lit the gas stove with a lighter to heat water for tea.  

I texted my boss again---still no power.

Along with water for tea, I heated water to take to the bathroom sink to wash my face, and take a sponge bath.

We made do with what we had on hand for breakfast, without opening the fridge.  A friend who lives nearby offered us her deep freeze, but we declined, reasoning that it would be cold in the house, and cold in the fridge, and we'd be okay if this only lasted for a day or two.

We'd just stocked up on meats and fish at Costco, and our little chest freezer was out in the shed.  We knew it would be okay for several days.

Dave went to the closest grocery store, and got us some canned foods that we could heat on the stove.

While it was daylight, I trimmed the candle wicks, and filled pots of water on the stove to try to warm up the kitchen at least.  The house was deeply cold.

We wore coats and gloves, and could see our breath in the candle light.

Dave also remembered the big spot light with a battery pack that goes with the telescope.  He had fully charged it and put it away after our vacation.

We were able to charge our cell phones off of the battery pack, (which could, in turn, be recharged in the car while driving around), so that we could at least keep in touch via text.  No calls were going out, though.

Wednesday, Dave and the neighbor cleared our crepe myrtle off of their driveway, and a friend of the neighbor came over to help cut some of the hanging branches in our back yard, and to try to free that huge limb from the neighbors' fallen cable line, so it would be put back up.

Our tools are all electric, of course, so we could not do anything ourselves.

Also on Wednesday, as it kept raining, but the ice was starting to melt, Dave spotted a crew in our area with a big truck and cherry picker.

He went and talked to them, and they said we would be back up and running by sundown......they were gone by sundown.

Thursday morning, I got up and lit the stove, and heated the pots of water.  

I texted my boss---still no power.  

(Hers had come back on Wednesday.)

Dave signed us up for alerts and updates from the power company, so we could know when to hope for restoration.

The first alert said it would be on by 10 pm.

The alerts turned out to be an emotional roller coaster, though.  Over the two weeks we were without power, with every "expected repair time" being pushed back, one after the other, I completely gave up hope, and stopped believing them.

It just kept getting colder in the house.  This was making all of my joints and tendons hurt, thanks to the hormone blocking medication I have to take.

Dave decided that we needed to go somewhere to get warm, access WiFi, and have a hot meal, so we drove south to the neighboring town of Moore, where Dave's parents had lived.

We found an open restaurant, without a line, and hesitatingly went inside.  There's still a pandemic happening, of course, and Okies are notorious "deniers."

This restaurant was observing protocols, though, and we felt relatively safe.   It felt SO GOOD to be warm.

On the way home, on the highway, suddenly, there was a large roll of black plastic in our lane.  Dave had to brake suddenly, and hard, and the young woman behind us was following too close.  She slammed into our back bumper.

Dave got us pulled through the right lane, and onto the shoulder, traffic, loaded with semi trucks,  was going past us at 65 to 70 miles per hour.

The young woman pulled over, too.... I was so glad that we had not been killed, which we could EASILY have been, that I was actually happy to see her step up to the car, without a mask on...

I got out as Dave called 911.  

We asked each other if we were okay, and she said yes, I said "I think so, but  you should get back in your car, my husband is calling for help."

She struck me as being VERY young.  In fact, while we waited for the highway patrol to show up, another vehicle arrived, and it turned out to be her mom.

Mom came to our car, also without a mask, to ask if we were okay.  

Finally, the cop showed up, took our statement and our licenses and insurance card.  He was not wearing a mask.

Dave and he talked a while, and Dave got back in the car and looked up a lawyer on line.

The officer did not give the girl (who turned out to be 16) a ticket, and as he was leaning into my window to hand back our licenses and insurance card, his spittle landed on my face.

I was, of course, wearing my mask, but still..... unbelievable.

The damage to our car is not too bad, just the bumper.  

The lawyer said he would direct us to a doctor for our obvious neck injuries.  I had put my hands up to brace my head when I saw her coming, but Dave experienced a full whiplash.

It would be weeks before we could get an appointment, because the doctors' offices in our part of town were also without power.  We finally have an appointment, though, which is tomorrow.

That afternoon, our friends who come for Christmas Eve dinner every year offered us their guest room, and a hot shower.

We took them up on the shower, and a chance to do laundry, but declined sleeping at their house, as they have 4 dogs, and Dave's anxiety can't handle a lot of barking.

We were also concerned about possible looting.  We had no steady access to news, and the nights so far had been very dark, and full of sirens, and even gun shots on Tuesday night.

The shower was wonderful, I hadn't washed my hair since Monday morning....but we needed to get home before dark.  

In the meantime, we remembered that I have a little boom box in my office area, so Dave got batteries for it, and we could listen to the radio news.  Yay!  

We heard reports that there were power crews from 18 other states working on the damage in OKC day and night.  The ones who ultimately came to our neighborhood were from Arkansas, and one of the crews that had come and gone (and done nothing) earlier in the week had been from Louisiana.

With the boom box, we could also play cds while we sat at the table, in the candle light, at night.  (This became our new routine, and was quite pleasant). 

Cleaning up after our canned ravioli for dinner, I discovered that the kitchen sink was clogged... remember that Dave was cleaning up from dinner on Tuesday night when the power went out?

For some reason, it had been flowing okay so far, but suddenly, no more.  The dirty dishes were piling up, and the sink was starting to smell bad.  

On Friday morning, I texted my boss---still no power.

We went to a pub (where we could sit outside in the 65 degrees) to get lunch, WiFi, and charge our battery pack and devices.  On the way home, we got more candles and canned goods, and some paper bowls to reduce dishes we had to wash.

Dave couldn't figure out how to unclog the sink without making a horrible mess, and I decided we REALLY needed to wash the dishes.  I get anxiety if there are dirty dishes piled up!

So, before it got dark, and after I did my daily candle wick trimming, we took all of the dishes outside, and I made buckets of warm water by mixing heated water from the stove into the buckets of hose water...it worked!

Dave THEN realized that the OTHER side of the sink was working fine...HAHA!!  SO we only did dishes outside the one time. 

The weather had warmed up, and by opening windows to let the warmer outdoor air in, and keeping pots on the stove filled with water, we finally got the house up to 60 degrees over the first weekend.

Halloween came and went, and no one got to enjoy it.

Sunday, a friend met us and bought us lunch (socially distanced), then back to the pub to plug things in and have a beer.  Lastly, we took a drive around to charge the battery pack. When we got home, there were power company trucks on our street, but they were just sitting there.  They left by dark. 

Any time we had seen any trucks in our area, they left by dark...and we were still in the dark. 

Sunday afternoon, after we got home from taking showers at our friends' house again, I texted my boss --- still no power.

That was when I found out that they were going to put a computer on my desk at the office, and that I would have to go to work.

I'd been off for a week of vacation, and the next week for no electricity or internet....save 4 hours on Monday.... they needed to stop paying me for not working, I guess.

Dave's employer also required him to pack up his computer and monitor, and go work at his office.

Monday morning saw Dave going to work to set his stuff up, and then he had to come get me, and I went to work at my office for a half day.

So, here we were, a full week without electricity, in the midst of a COVID spike in Oklahoma that was breaking all previous records, and we had to go back to our offices.

When I got there Monday, there was another person in my area, whose power was also still out, and she was not wearing a mask.  I just carefully kept my distance, and wore my mask.

I'd been of the understanding that I would be alone in my area of the office....I found her presence distressing.

She was there Tuesday, too....election day... but said that her Jehovah's Witness community was all staying home on Wednesday, due to the possibilities of public unrest due to the election.

I was glad to be alone on Wednesday.

There were other people in the building, but no one else in my area that day.

Having to go to work during the pandemic was stressful enough, but put on top of it that now, thanks to the time change, it was getting dark an hour earlier.

Now, we could not go shower at our friends' house AND still get home before dark.  

We had to rush home every day, so I could trim candle wicks, and get the water going on the stove to try to warm up the house a little in the hour before dark.

SO, I had Dave bring in the giant roasting pan, and we put the big soup kettle, and the dutch oven, all on the stove filled with water, and would carry it into the bath tub, mix with cold water, and we were able to take "sitz baths."   It was luke-warm, but it felt like heaven.

I still had to wash my hair in the ice cold tap water at the kitchen sink, though.  Ugh.  I waited as long as I could, until I couldn't stand it anymore.

Thursday, my supervisor and another person were both in my area for the morning-half of the day (they are there every week at that time), which made me uncomfortable, but we all wore our masks, so hopefully, we were all safe.

Friday, when I left work, I just left all of my stuff at the office, assuming that we would still be without power, or at least internet, on Monday.  The cable company had said that there was still a widespread outage.

So... Dave and I both worked the whole week at our offices, taking our sitz baths at night, and by Friday, I was desperate to try to wash my hair again...and hoped it could be with somewhat warm water, so I did it outside, before dark, using the garden hose, which had been lying in the sun all day.   

The water in the hose was a LITTLE warmer than the cold tap, but by the time I was doing my final rinse, the warmer water was gone.

Saturday, we emptied the fridge and freezer into the trash, all of our food lost.  $600 worth of meats, fish, and prepared meals, that I had made with love and stored in the freezer.

Finally, on Sunday, there were crews on our street again.  They arrived at sunrise... Hmmm.... could it be??

This time, while Dave was out driving around to charge the battery pack, and getting a couple of errands done, there was a lineman on the pole in our back yard.  This gave me a sense of hope...for a little while.

Our latest update said we would have power by 9 pm that day, but I had stopped believing those updates. 

It got dark, the crews, who had been here all day, were beginning to leave the area.  

We were despondent.  

We took our sitz baths,  9 pm came and went, with no further updates from the power company, and we went to bed.  I was crying.

Lying there in the dark, wondering when this ordeal would end, and suddenly (I don't remember what time it was), the power came back on.

I literally ran out into our driveway (which the neighbors had FINALLY cleared that day), and yelled "THANK YOU!" at the top of my voice....  

Dave immediately ran the garbage disposal to clear the sink drain..AHHHH!

We checked the internet... it was WORKING!

We immediately plugged our phones in to charge, and I texted my boss... WE HAVE POWER AND INTERNET!!!

So, because I had left all of my stuff at work on Friday, I worked one more day in the office.  Since we only have one car, it would have been complicated to get Dave moved back home, and me, on the same day.

He went to his office and collected his computer and monitor, and got set up at home again.   When he picked me up at 4:30, I packed all of my stuff up, and would return to working from home Tuesday morning.

That night, we placed a grocery order, and I took a hot bath....

Wednesday was a federal holiday, and I had my annual well woman visit at the gynecologist.  It was lovely to be able to take a hot shower before going to that appointment.

We did errands, and started to try to return our home to normal.  I vacuumed the bedroom rug for the first time in over 2 weeks!

In the days of this past week, power restored, trying to get back to normal, I have been having insomnia, and nightmares when I DO sleep.  I keep reliving the car accident, and the cold and dark.

Last night, I was awake until 5 am.  

I am very jumpy, and am thinking this is a form of PTSD.  That experience was extremely stressful.

The week we were at our offices, I also had to get my labs drawn, and go to the oncologist.  Fortunately, my lab work looked great!  I have now been reduced to only getting labs, and only seeing the doc, every other month.

Yesterday, we  withdrew a pile of money from the bank, and paid a crew to clean up our tree damage.  The entire width of our lot, out at the curb, is once again full of branches and limbs.  My willow and pecan trees have vastly different profiles, now, and I wept as they were trimmed.

Today, I will be making a pot of soup with left over roast chicken from last night. 

Next week, we will hopefully just settle back into our new 2020 normal, and in the process, settle up some of our plans for our Thanksgiving trip.

We will be renting a van, because we have to take all utensiles and dishes, and Dave wants to take the telescope, and the guitars.... 

The firewood has already been purchased, so we are starting to get ready.  It is much needed this year.

Maybe more than ever before....

Oh, and Dave got an estimate for the damage to the car.  It's mostly invisible, internal damage, and the girl's insurance will be paying for that repair.

Happy Sunday, gentle readers, and if you've stayed with me through every word, you're a trooper!