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Thursday, June 30, 2005

Everyone Needs A Hobby

 Vincent's  big hobby is sleeping which he does quite well and anywhere. The pool continues to leak, but remains fairly clear so I think we can hang in there a few more days. David thinks it will go down another 4 or 5 inches and then stop there. When we moved in it was low, but not empty so we can hope! All of the frogs are pretty much gone (during the day at least) but we have one very stubborn frog that I've been evicting daily and back he comes. Yesterday after the 4rth eviction I confess to a tiny bit of Frog Abuse and  did indeed shake him like a Polaroid Picture, but just a little. As you can see from the picture no frogs were harmed. Sigh. I posted the latest pictures of the house, when David finishes it's going to be really nice - the style fits the house much better than the green,red and white I think. Of course that would be true of anything green, red and white. With the exception of the italian flag. Jackson's finger was less swollen yesterday, he went to Becky's and she no longer kicks him, now she slaps him. It's her turn to come over here today and then I think Marcus will be visiting on the weekend. My job hunting continues, I won't hear about the doctor's office until 2 weeks from now so I have that on the back burner, next week I'll hear about the agency job, I have an interview on friday at Fairmont and hopefully the paperwork for the travel job will be in the mail. We had a huge thunderstorm last night, We had a lightening strike in the yard which made everything like daylight, Copper was having a fit and tailing everyone around the house. The last picture is the singlewide down the road who's front yard is right on route 100. All of the trailers on this road are kept neat beyond belief - a lot of yard competion going on. That trailers' front yard has a shed, pool, trampoline and driveway all in about 75 yards of space! I heard from David this morning, he's busy at Ray's and they're having a good time. He was going to try to get back to LI this weekend but remembered it was 4rth of July so has decided not to. The traffic will be horrific to put it mildly especially with the 4rth landing on the weekend. He's going to get our stuff in Pa and then will be home Monday or Tuesday.

Tuesday, June 28, 2005

The Way Out

David left for NJ this morning dragging his feet all the way out to the truck. He's made so many trips back and forth I think the idea of driving the 400 miles to Rays' just wears him out thinking about it. He'll be stopping in Pa to get the rest of our stuff and also talk to the RE. The house hasn't sold yet so I think we're going to have to look into renting it for the year and then put it back on the market next spring. The pool continues to leak, we're down about 6 inches from Sunday - we havent' been able to run the pump but the chemicals are keeping the water for now so I'll leave it be. Still no word from the home care agency, I'm beginning to feel like I have the plague. I did finally hear from Mon Gen - they declined to interview me further because of my frequent moves from hospital to hospital. Great. I have an interview for a doctor's office this morning and I'm getting paperwork from the travel nurse agency. You don't have to really travel if you dont' want to and the pay is spectacular - with benefits - so it's worth checking it out. Becky was over yesterday and there were no further incidents, Jackson continues to torment her of course. When we got in the car to drive her home he told her to put on her seat belt - just in case of an ACCIDENT..... His finger is swollen of course and hurts, but not too bad. This morning turn of events was we are being infested by milipedes of all things. It's just in one part of the house and honestly, they aren't overly creepy looking so I'll just vacuum them up and see if there isn't anything I can put down. The problem here with insecticides is the zoo which seems to be drawn to an posionous substance I put down and no matter how carefully I hide it, they seem to be able to sniff it out. Of course on the other hand if one of them DOES manage to eat the poison that will be one less mouth to feed so it could be a win win situation.

PS!! Just got off the phone with MHS - Jackson was approved and will be attending Morgantown High School in the fall!

Monday, June 27, 2005

No, that is not a gang sign............

It's what your finger looks like if Becky is over and your parents have gone out for ONLY HALF AN HOUR and you're horsing around and Becky lands a perfect kick on your hand. This is what we came home to - David and I just ran down the road after dropping Becky off to buy him some t shirts and they were supposed to be swimming. So David drove Becky home and I took Jackson to the ER. After the XRay determined it wasn't broken the MD relocated it - no painkillers as she said the digital blocker actually hurts more to get than the relocation procedure which took about 30 seconds. He's got to wear the splint for a few days but other than that, he's fine. He came home and called Becky to let her know the doctor could do nothing for him and he was given 3 months to live. Then he told her they amputated. She's coming back over today since they're visit was cut short and hopefully everyone will keep thier feet to themselves. As far as the pool is concerned we ran it for a long time yesterday and now we're letting it  leak to see where we need to patch. The way things have been going lately, I'm sure it's on the bottom. David heads off for NJ for the week tomorrow and I have massive amounts of phone calling and so forth to do this week. I'm supposed to hear about the visit nurse job today, keep your fingers crossed for me. Church was good yesterday, they're considering the minister who spoke a couple of weeks ago but seemed to feel she mentioned god too much in her topic so everyone is up in the air about her. I've been meeting people there, there's one woman in particular that I have alot in common with  - it would be nice to have someone to hang around with.I think I might start volunteering once I get this job thing settled. The church does a lot of community services and has a big habitat for humanity project coming up and they also help run the soup kitchen.

Sunday, June 26, 2005

The Hot Spot

It's amazing that the signs for this place are bigger than the actual establishment - "The Hot Spot" is a single wide trailer with an Open sign by the door. David and I have not gone in there yet. The Hot Spot is some sort of franchise around here, you see them all over the place in a variety of building so apparently anyone can have one. The businesses on rt 19 and100 are interesting to say the least. David has been hacking at the trees again, they're way overgrown and were blocking a lot of the sun to the house. I think he got a bit overenthused with the one in the middle which I didn't photogragh as he'll end in Tree Jail for assault. We packed Jackson in the car after that and took route 19 all the way to Fairmont - we've been taking the road less travelled lately as you see all sorts of interesting things that way. We stopped at a home based nursery and lucked out on a last day 75% off sale and got a bunch of plants for the backyard- $18 filled the whole back of my car. The pictures of the bridge I took in Fairmont, people were launching boats and swimming in the river. We did Sam's club and then came home. The pool water is still a tiny bit cloudy but  much better - I convinced Jackson to come in which he argued with me at first and then came in with me and David. And just for the record, he was the last one out of the pool. David and I decided we're going to let the pool leak for today and tomorrow so we can figure out where it is - we wanted to give it a few days for the chemicals to work and not have to deal with the green stuff. The next rehab is the slide which desparately needs to be refinished. Jackson did try it and skidded down and stopped dead at the bottom - OUCH.

Saturday, June 25, 2005

How Do You Make A Frog Float?

sigh. The frogs appreciate the float Janet gave David for his birthday this year. We've discovered at night there appears to be a large amount of frog shinanigans going on in the pool. But if they're out by morning I guess it's not hurting anything. We're still leaking a bit, about 1/2 an inch at night, but it's slowed down a lot. We know the liner was damaged by the water just sitting in it for a few years but we hope to get at least this season out of it. We'll call the pool guys at some point to see if they can find it, but we can just replenish it at night until the end of the season. We finally fired up the pool yesterday, David had quite a time with it, the 3rd picture is what shot out of the jets, is that not disgusting or what? And since we hadn't been able to run it up til now the pool had already started sliming up, but we scrubbed down the sides and flung Shock in and within two hours it was all gone. I spent the rest of the afternoon paddling around the pool with David. He wanted to go paint but after all the effort he's put in I convinced to enjoy it for a few minutes.I interviewed for the visit nurse position on Thursday and will hear from them on Monday - after I went in and interviewed I really want this job. It's alot of driving, but the pay is the same as the hospitals AND no weekends or holidays. So if I'm not hired there, maybe that will be my new direction - I also have an interview for a doctor's office. David's heading off for NJ this week to do Ray's house and to collect the last load of stuff from Pa. He's also got to talk with our RE agent, the house still has not sold - we've lowered the price on it, but we might also be looking into renting it for a year and waiting until next summer to put it back on the market. We really didn't want to do that but right now the PA house is sucking wind and also sucking out our bank account. We wouldn't be making a profit but it would pay for itself. David continues to work on the house, he and Jackson took down the silly deck in the back and will eventually move it near the pool. They'd put a deck on the back (one of the "improvements") but there was no access to it. To get to it you have to walk all the way around the house(it's not near any doors or walkways), so it wasn't really usable for BBQs and it was tucked  where the house jogs in so you got a lovely view of the shed. David and I are planning on going to a few yard sales today, but I'm not sure why. We can't find any place for our stuff, why we wouldwant to add someone else's is a mystery to us all.

Thursday, June 23, 2005

Who Let The Cows Out

When coming home yesterday the cows on rt 100 were out again, they seem to spend more time outside the pen than in. We're still in the midst of "stuff" that is never ending. I've got two interviews today, one for Fairmont and one for homecare, leaning more toward the homecare. The school thing with Jackson drags on. I spoke to University High and she said there was no point in enrolling him if I was going to transfer the next day so she called them and then me. Next week I call MHS and if he's accepted there then I can skip UHS - sounds good to me. I called his old high school and he passed everything and they'll be sending his grades along. Then he had to have a TB test because he left the state and came back so we went up to the walk in clinic and had that done. The pool thing is quickly turning into a mess, we have it almost filled and left the water off last night so it didn't get overfilled and found it about two inches lower this morning, we have a leak and about 25,000 gallons to go. So we will be forced to call Those That Like Our Checkbook. I found the number of the company  the former owners had used and the first thing they wanted to know was where they were since there was an extremely large bill with thier name on it. Seems Mr. Minister skipped out on the bill they'd been trying to collect on for the past 2 or 3 years. The company had gotten out of the pool service gig a year ago so we have to find someone else, but hopefully we can at least get a year out of this liner before we have to get a new one.

Wednesday, June 22, 2005

I Owe My Soul To The Company Store

Did I say we live near the coal mines? We do! I took pictures of one, not sure what the equipment is, at least not all of it. It's along the river, Jackson and I saw them loading the huge barges one day. At night you can hear the hum of equipement all the way to our house. You can't go in the mines though - there's all sorts of silly DANGER, NO TRESSPASSING, etc signs so it's not possible to go frolicking about in the shafts. Yesterday I took Jackson to the mall in Bridgeport to Hot Topic where we purchased one pair of shorts. $48 shorts I might add. They're worth every penny though - they have metal rings and chains and loops - and go down to his shins. He was thrilled. We did lunch and came home to a Grumpy Person in the living room who was wrestling with the fax machine and the Morgantown High School people. Turned out we had to get Jackson's transfer paperwork in TODAY. So we got back in the car and down to the central building where we filled it out and handed it back in. Then I was told I have to enroll Jackson pronto to University since you can't transfer out of a school that you're not in. That would be today's project. David continues to paint the house, he just needs to reside one more greeny section to make it look really decent. It's pouring this morning so the greeny section will have to wait. The pool is almost filled, we have another inch to go and then we'll be firing it up, cross your fingers the equipement still works. I can't wait to dump chemicals in it as we're still fending off the frogs.I let Vincent out for a few minutes yesterday but then brought him back in. The big problem is the baby birds in the breezeway, they're starting to flutter in a delicious way so the cats might have to wait on any adventures they have.

Monday, June 20, 2005

Green Green Go Away

Honestly, the greeny part looks way worse in real life. David hasn't done that side yet but will be doing it later on this summer. He did the garage because the window needed to be replaced pronto and that's the most visable part of the house. We did a bit of driving around yesterday and found there are a host of back roads that run along side of the highway but go on for miles before you can get back on. Everything is beautiful this time of year, completely green and overgrown. Jackson had a great time at Marcus's so we'll have to invite him over in the next week or so. I'd like to wait til we get the pool done though, we have another foot to go water wise and then we'll be ready to fire it up. I'm a bit scared though since we are waiting for The Third Thing. I havent been able to find a job and then yesterday afternoon Harry from Pa called to tell us the people that have our house under contract were denied a mortgage so we're back on the market AGAIN. This is the FOURTH time we've sold the house and had it fall through, I can't take too much more of this especially with my job situation, sleep doesn't come too easily these days. So now we wait for the 3rd bad thing to happen. Hopefully it will be a little quicker and less painless than the last two. And on a happier note, the last two pictures are of Mr. Lee who doesn't seem to realize she's 15 and was playing hard with the foil balls we bought her. And of course that silly baby blanket she's so fond of, she'll sleep where ever you put it so at the moment we have it on the back of the couch in front of the window. The problem is that everyone else would like a turn on the baby blanket so she's fairly vigilant to plant herself on it before anyone else can (Vincent!).

Sunday, June 19, 2005

How Green Is My Valley....

....but the better question is How Orange Is My Water?! Near the coal mining the water is orange for some reason and it looks very bizarre. Nobody seems to mind it though and it does look very pretty with all the greenery. I took a picture of the bird's nest in our breezeway but I had to do it quick so its not that great of a shot. David mowed some paths through one of the front penned areas and the dogs love it, they can spend hours snuffling around and pointing bunnies. David talked to one of our neighbors yesterday, she said the previous owners had only been here for 3 years and seemed to think they were sitting on a gold mine. They were originally asking  well over $200,000, she thought they were nuts. I think it was less of a gold mine than a trash heap! David's still removing their "improvements" and it turns out the reason the pool looked like that was because they thought it was too expensive to run it. Don't you think you would've drained it at least?? We're still messing with it by the way, we're not sure if we have a leak or the liner is stretching because the water looks lower this morning (we left the water off overnight). We'll start filling this morning and then if it continues we'll have to call in the pool guy. Jackson is over Marcus's at the moment, he was invited to sleep over last night - we barely see him anymore since we moved back. David's residing the rest of the lime green parts of the house outside, AS MUCH AS WE LOVE THAT COLOR. It goes so well with the red trim. Ha. And people think I have bad taste!

Saturday, June 18, 2005

The Street Where You Live

Jackson was a major Mr. Crabbypants yesterday, he was invited to Becky's house but wasn't sure what time and didn't want to call her from the car,etc....the whole thing boils down to Potential Embarrassment. I did dump him off around 1-ish and then went into Morgantown to walk about and take pictures. Also to do some food shopping - this is an excellent place to be a vegetarian. The 1st picture is the chinese grocery which is in the back of a building. It looks terrible from the outside, doesn't it? But it's a great store and they have everything you need. The 2nd picture is the Mountain People Co-Op which is run by the local Back To Nature crew, no one wears make-up or leather, they have a huge selection of tofu,soy,etc and a lot of trendy "natural" stuff which is fun to look at. I've discovered  that any hygiene products they sell, you end up smelling like dope or like you're covering up the fact you smell like dope. I actually ran into some I know!! in town which was very fun - that's the first time that's happened. On the job front I called the home care agency just to see and found they pay only a dollar less than the local hospitals plus benefits so I think I may be giving that a go. And I have no idea what happened at Mon General, I called 3 times and emailed and never got any response.I would've liked to worked there, but on the other hand it might be nice to work under not so stressful conditions all the time.  Jackson had a good time at Becky's, her parents took them out to dinner and I picked him up around 10pm. David doesn't like me taking route 100 at night, but I ignore him because I LOVE rt 100 - it's all hairpin turns, one lane bridges, bars, coal mining, up and down, and (bonus!)shaves about 5 miles off my trip. Jackson and I pulled off the road one night and turned out the headlights to see what "dark" really looks like. It was pretty cool. And the last two pictures are of my current project of course!

Friday, June 17, 2005

Viva La Differance

We figure another day or two and the pool will be ready to open! Can you believe the difference? I thought we'd never be able to get it clean, the very bottom is still a tiny bit mucky, but it's mainly dirt that's down there and I think once we shock it and get the pump going that will clear it up. I dropped off my application to the hospital in Waynesburg yesterday and am applying to another today, but I'm beginning to consider maybe I don't want to be a hospital nurse anymore. So in addition I'll be looking into other things, right now we're ok so it's a good time to do it. Jackson is going over Becky's today again and I once again, have a million errands to run. All the Father's day gifts will be late, I meant to get to it earlier in the week, but one thing after another happened so I'll get to it today or tomorrow. We still haven't let the cats out, we've been discussing it daily but are too scared to attempt it. I told David I would take pictures of them so if they did get lost we'd have it to post, but he asked who would see it - the cows?? I think we'll let Claw out first, like I said she doesn't really wander too much and she's the most "expendable" anyhow - let her go bite some other family. We still have a laundry list of other projects to tackle, David got a good deal on light gray paint so he's considering us starting the living room which is done in Brady Bunch Fake Wood Paneling. We haven't moved into a house yet that didn't look like Marsha just left.

Thursday, June 16, 2005

Running The Border

 I applied to another hospital yesterday - it's in Pennsylvania but we're only ten minutes from the border so it's not much more of a drive than to Morgantown. David and I have been making great use of our GPS - we're discovering a lot of little back roads that hook up with the major routes and highways around here, not to mention shortcuts. We took these pictures of victorian houses near the hospital, and then drove around a bit scoping out the town. We took the truck because my tire was flat and was being repaired. When we got home David decided to attack the tree in the front and enlisted Jackson's help. There were a lot of dead branches and with all the storms we get he thought it would be safer to cut them off before they came through the window one night. Then he went to the gun club for the work day. While he was gone some guy came here trying to sell me meat off the back of his truck. For some reason I'm not overly comfortable buying perishable food items from someone I don't know out of the bed of thier truck. So I said the "V" word and he ran away! We're still filling the pool, we figure it'll take a few more days since we do the majority of it at night. A few tiny frogs have tried to infiltrate but we are forever on the alert and repel them. Speaking of repelling things, someone's been rather active in Virus Land  launching attacks on my computer trying to infiltrate it with W32_SQLEXP_Worm_Propagation which is nothing short of annoying. They've been unsucessful but it gets tiresome after awhile of alert after alert as they tap on various ports and accesses. We've always had to lower our firewall to get online with the Norton and to this day I have no idea how to configure it to work. I make the occasional effort to do so, but that tends to result in me frantically trying to undo whatever it was that I did or just hoping I didn't do more damage than good. I also know where "restore" is, don't you wish life had that program??

Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Ho. Hum.

Things are quieting down a bit, David finished cleaning out the pool - I offered to help but due to my disorder - Terminal Klutz - he declined. The bottom was grosser than you can imagine - David took a trash can and literally shoveled out the sludge in the bottom, it  had the consistancy of pudding. Green stinky pudding. We started refilling it last night, this morning there's enough water to paddle around in the deep end. We figure it's going to take a few days and we just leave the water running into it at night. David and I did errands, ordered checks and ATM cards, etc, got home around 2:30 in time for me to get back in the car with Jackson and go to pick up Becky since it's her turn to visit us. I went to Poppa Johns for pizza and tried to pay with a hundred dollar bill which was all I had. They didn't have enough change(which I found very odd, they're a pretty busy place in town). Then I gave her my credit card, she couldnt edit, got the manager and the upshot was I got FREE pizzas!! Whoo hoo. When I was younger I used to feel guilty about the occasional accidental free stuff, like I was taking something I didn't deserve. Now that I'm older I realize freebies are pretty far and few between so grab em while you can! We had yet another fast thunderstorm, they only last about 10 minutes but are rather fierce. I had the dogs out in the front field and Copper was getting panicky, as we might not have time to run and hide under the kitchen counter. Rin Tin Tin he is not.

Tuesday, June 14, 2005

Everybody Out Of The Pool!

Yesterday wasn't  great for me, I STILL haven't heard from Mon General so I'm thinking they aren't going to hire me. I'll call once more but I guess it's time to move on. We did major food shopping and when we got back found Charger had knocked Vincent's bowl to the floor and it shattered in a million pieces. I cleaned up while they brought in all the groceries but must've missed a piece so now in addition to the cuts, bruises, sun burn, and poison ivy, I'm limping. It's not too deep, but down the middle of the ball of my foot which makes it very painful. We also rented a pump since this week's project is the pool. Most of the frogs were gone, except for one tiny one and the Big One. David and I scrubbed as it drained, but the worst is still left, all the sludge concentrated in the very bottom so I'm planning on being Faint and Slightly Feverish today to get out of that duty. We caught the big frog and I put him in a bucket with an old dishpan on top so I could bring him down to the stream on Rt 100 when I went to pick up Jackson. He was over visiting Becky so around 9 pm I left - I heard a noise from the bucket (which I'd wedged in the front), but frogs do jump around so I didn't think much of it. I pulled over a little down the road, got the bucket, walked to the creek.....there was no frog in the bucket. Hmm.I checked again and swirled the water this way and that - no frog. City Wide Panic ensued. I DID NOT FIND IT. I'm thinking that when I walked down to the creek I'd left the door open so hopefully he jumped out. It made the ride to Becky's a bit stressful though, believe me. Here is the really stupid part - if I had thought about it ALL the other frogs have left and obviously have gone somewhere so all I really had to do was kick him out. Now I've got to worry about  sudden frog  attacks  while driving or even worse, what if it crawled in my dashboard and dies?? Only me. Becky is coming to visit us today and Jackson's informed me she'll need a ride, I hope she doesn't mind the Frog Mobile...

Monday, June 13, 2005

Call Of The Mild

Some take the not working on Sunday thing to new heights, don't they? We haven't let Claw or Vincent out yet, despite their numerous protests and attempts. Claw generally sticks close to the house (i.e. her food bowl) but there's so much woods and open land here if they wander away - that will be it I think. We didn't do too much yesterday - we let Jackson sleep in as he was exhausted. I went to church!! - yes me - I joined the Unitarian Church a few weeks ago and it's great. It's a small church that was established 1954 and has a very active membership. I've met quite a few people and found out the next time I get in the poison ivy to take a shower with Dawn dishwashing soap. Wish I'd know that LAST week - I'm quite covered at this point needless to say and if I could've crawled out of my skin yesterday I would've. We were going to go to Sam's Club but I told David to find out when the meeting was for the gun range - he had to attend to rejoin. He thought it was at night but when he called Cecil's house, his wife told David he was already down there and the meeting was at 3. David took my car (his truck is full of trash to be dumped off today)so Jackson and I watched Harry Potter and ate hot dogs(mine were vegetarian of course!), then went out and sat in the yard under the trees. Now that we're no longer looking at trash, it's a beautiful view! David had a good time at the range, got a lot of ribbing from everyone but they were all glad to see him back. The entire time we were in Pa David didn't shoot once and I know he missed it a great deal. The last picture today I took last week when I was driving around, anyone who grew up in the 70's will recognize that name. And for the record, Booberry  and Count Chocula must be buried somewhere else!

Sunday, June 12, 2005

Trash Day!

Remember I said these people left trash? I took pictures while we were cleaning it up yesterday. Just for the record, Jackson stated loudly several times this was NOT the way he'd envisioned spending his summer.Since we had the UHaul trailer we're keeping it a couple extra days to finish hauling a major portion of it to the dump. The trailer is 6 x 12 and we've filled it twice, plus the entire back of David's truck. My opinion of these people is pretty low, since they had handicapped foster kids there was a ton of medical supplies, just wasted. They left household trash, dirty diapers, boxes and boxes of clothes that obviously could've been donated had they not been left out in the rain, broken furniture, etc... We worked on the yard for about 6 or 7 hours straight yesterday just hauling garbage from every corner, but it already looks 100% better. And I'm sure since we got rid of that huge pile by the fence the neighbors will like us better. We'll be unpacking for the rest of the summer I think, Jackson has moved into the basement for the time being. His future bedroom is the worst and will be the first major overhaul done, probably in the fall. Until then I'd wanted him to move into one of the upstairs bedrooms bur David ok'd his subterranean digs so he quick ran all of his stuff down there. He lives in the corner of it (it's a pretty sizable area), David gave him an old couch and will be running a cable line down there in the next week. I was a little concerned about dampness but we'll just get a dehumidifier. Things in the house are going a bit better, I thought we had roaches but on closer inspection they've turned out to be woodroaches which are ok. They ARE roaches, but don't breed in the house and tend to bumble in. They like light and you see them during the day - I'd seen a couple roaches and panicked but the last one I caught squeezing in the screen during the day and have seen no evidence of any others. We have a bird's nest in the breezeway but we're going to leave it alone, I don't know who's more interested in the future baby birds - Jackson or the cats. Mr. Lee looks at the nest like it's a tray of appetizers at a party.The last picture today is a bar down the road from us, Judi's - it took me a couple of drives by it before I realized it's open. I don't know if it's as upscale as Willy's Bar and Lounge, but I'll let you know

Saturday, June 11, 2005

Things That Go Sump In The Night

I'd forgotten how different storms are here, one minute it's blue skies and the next it's like night time. I managed to get a picture of the thunderstorm lines blowing in, they were running  the I-79 corridor at  50 miles an hour. By the time I got home the wind was howling and the rain was coming down in buckets. I called David because the sump pump wasn't pumping but he said it had to get higher, so I stopped worrying until the power blew out. Hmmm. Of course I had no flashlight, so I had to make due with the tea lights left over from christmas and a candle Jackson made in the 5th grade when the wick drifted to one side....I got power back around 2 am - I'd forgotten to turn off everything so the TV was on, etc... ANYHOW, I've been here by myself for the past two weeks with the zoo. The first week went fast, unpacking, cleaning - apparently the former owners were not familiar with things such as a "mop" or "bathroom cleaner" and worst of all, were unable to find the dump so they utilized the yard. David has called them several times as they were supposed to get rid of all the trash and just left it for us and the neighbors. They're not returning phone calls of course.It's ALOT and big stuff - fridge, furniture, etc.  I took care of the house hold trash and we're just going to truck it out a little at a time. David and Jackson arrived yesterday - there's one more small load in PA, but he has to go back to help Ray with his house and will get it then. I'm a bit worse for wear - sunburned, bugbites, poison ivy, some fairly significant bruising, but it just gives me character. I had one job interview, but haven't heard anything as of yet so will be applying to Fairmont Gen. Hospital. Jackson's in good spirits, he helped David unpack and then went to the movies with his friend Marcus to see Star Wars last night. I'll probably be writing alot to catch up, but for now it's off to the trash heaps.