Quirky little critters aren't they?

searching

The car search goes on.

We own an 8 year old pickup that is very nice, but gets 16 miles per gallon average. I bought it when gas was a little over a dollar a gallon! The other is a 20 year car that gets almost twice as many miles out of a gallon of gas, but is showing it’s age.

I bought the last 3 vehicles new. Buying used is a hugely different deal.

I heard of a people making fast decisions about these thing, but not me this time. I comb Ebay. I look on Craig’s List. Edmonds.com has become a regular visit, as has fueleconomy.gov. Did you know that there was once a Geo and a Pontiac that were made by Toyota? I learn stuff like that.

My spreadsheet calculates the actual cost of a vehicle, including maintenance (Edmonds will guess for you). I calculate which car might save more than it costs. For some reason I compute that on an 8 year clock.

I found a beautiful VW New Beetle in Florida that would be a fine ride. It will get around 50 mpg on a gallon of higher priced diesel. And there is a beautiful Ford Focus (bright yellow) in Spokane. There are others that look really good, but to many fit my criteria.

My spreadsheet tells me that the VW would be good, that mileage is great, but the VW costs a lot more to buy and Diesel cost more than gasoline, and because that 50 MPG is in demand the newest I might afford is 11 or 12 years old. The Focus, on the other hand, is only 5 years old, and though it gets less MPH, my spreadsheet tells me it is a better buy for me.

So I analyze and hope I am making the right decision for the right car.

"Mommy, can I have one?"

thinking

It looks like the sale of the house is coming along quite well.

That means I might have the luxury of thinking of what I might do with some it.

A newer small car to travel in? A small stand alone studio/shop? Retrofitting a space here? Moving the Coachmen travel trailer and where to put it?

A flood of thoughts mash and bash in my head. Some of them are conscious and some just below the conscience line.

There had been talk of buying another piece of property that had a shop/studio, but the owner's price was way not acceptable, and no one has the heart to negotiate too seriously.

So I think an think. Haven't spent any money.

And the car thing. I do spreadsheets of cost estimates. I research every small car I can think of. Price? Dependability? Miles on a gallon of fizz water and so on. I am liable to research this one completely to death, but I do it any way.

There is no hurry on much of this, but it would be nice to have a warm dry studio space before the cold wet fall sets in.

And so I think and think.

Wheat harvest is in full swing, about a month late.
This Elevator, which might look abandoned, is filling or full.
Later the wheat will be trucked to the Snake river and loaded on barges heading somewhere

dull

This has not been an exciting time here of late

Aside from moving and putting the house up for sale, there has not been too much to do this summer.

The garden here is in a keep up with it stage, which is not too hard. I don't have a studio yet and much of my art/craft stuff is still in Idaho, so I have been busy doing not too much. In Idaho the garden always needed more than i had time.

I am told we have a deal on the house, and there has been inquiry about a place here, and negotiations are ongoing, I am told, but I am not in the middle of it. Once in a while someone tells me a bit of something.

It is not that my family is being secretive, there just isn't too much of substance to talk about, so we don't.

Tomorrow I go to a luncheon at the only local nursing home that has an AD unit. I am sure it will be interesting, but hardly exciting.

Oh well, maybe the joy of excitement is over rated!

“Stay hungry, stay foolish.” Steward Brand on the last Whole Earth Catalog.

water

In our bus (we both know it is not legally mine, but since I live in it, I’ll use the first person) we have a good water heater.

But it is small, maybe 5 or 6 gallons and comes on with a switch. There is no automatic hot water. You turn the switch on and wait 20 or 30 minutes.

Tonight I turned the switch on while I was fixing dinner. After dinner I went out and dug up some strawberry plants. Of course I got nice and dirty in the process.

I came into the bus ready for a good hot shower. But when I turned the water on, after getting properly ready to shower, but the water was at best luke warm and it turned to cool.

Ahh, Miriam had washed the dishes and she has not learned to be careful with hot water. But it was hot so a cool shower was good.

In our house, we had a 20 gallon heater that would heat water almost as fast as it could be drawn out.

Life on 5 gallons of hot water does change some things.

crazy summer

This has been a crazy summer.

We moved 3 1/2 hours from out home in Idaho. We did not do much prior planning. The time was right and we did it. Now we have an agreement to sell our acre. We are selling in a very weak market, which means not as much money as we would like, but that is OK. The buyer is a young couple, good friends, who value the gardens and the plants.

This week we learn that my only sister has an inoperable, untreatable brain disease. We don't yet know what all of this means. It is a condition that seems to be rare. While it has a name, there is virtually nothing on the internet about it, so we are left in the blank for now.

Those are pretty gut wrenching events, and all happened this summer. Miriam is happy and that is very good. She has adjusted well. I am slowly finding my niche. But we are the only family my sister has. My daughters care deeply about her and will do all in their power to help, but right now no one even knows what to expect, and what we speculate is not good.

And, so it goes.

A good part of this is the natural product of aging. I don't think of myself as particularly old, but the numbers are there. No denial allowed.

The comfort in all of this is that our family are very close. We deeply care for each other.

For that I am eternally thankful.

This is the grandson who is referred to as "the baby" in the poem below.
It is hard to imagine that innocent looking boy causing so much commotion.

sick sick

When my youngest grandson was a baby, his mother, in frustration of new motherhood, wrote this piece. She is an excellent speller, but this was written on the fly, in the mood of the moment. I have reproduced it exactly as she wrote it.


sick, sick
both boys are sick
They’ve got the flu
What do I do?
Poo and throw up every where
I have no washing machine
It’s a bear
All appointments out the door
instead I’m home to clean the floor
Poo and throw up every where
Oh, there ’s some more
in that chair
The baby crys (sic!) he’s out of food
If I move Joshua it may be rude
Poo and throw up every where
my sick kids are quite the pair
I cannot go to the store
I cannot make it to the door
I cannot hear above the roar
of crying and Disney channel
it’s a war
I cannot get to the chore
of picking up stuff off the floor
Curtis may be home at four
Or it may be later
I can’t take more
Poo and throw up everywhere
look, I’ve got some in my hair
Baby is crabby
he wants held
If I hold him
food on the plaes wi be jelled
Poo and throw up everywhere
all outfits soiled, nothing to wear
throw up, diaper rash, diareah (sic), yeah!
snotty noses, whimpering noises, limp kneeses (sic), hey!
Poo and throw up everywhere
Mom did it for me. I guess it’s fair

I am fascinated by the randomness of tree bark.

the miserable ones

Tonight public TV showed a wonderful production of "Les Misérables."

It has been a while since I read the book. But so much of it comes through. It is a horrible story, yet it is a story of redemption of death and rebirth.

The book was good, but the music is unforgettable.

There are times when we all think our lives are pretty miserable. It goes with this thing called LIFE, I guess. Today i went to an AD support group, the first time I attended this group. There were half a dozen women, the facilitator, and me, the only guy.

In this town of 50,000 I am sure there are more than half a dozen people with some sort of dementia. Yet, most miserably they try to do it on their own. I am sure at least some do it wonderfully well.

I have attended an AD support group for most of the last dozen years. I am glad I have. I have learned a great deal by listening and participating in the discussions.

Today a lady told of how her husband won't go in the bathroom because there are horses in there. She went logical on him, explaining that there really weren't any. I said I would handle it differently. I'd go chase the horses back into the pasture, thank the new neighbor (as fictitious as the horses) for his help, and tell him all was clear now.

My reality is not hers, nor theirs. My system is pretty simple. I meet her on her level.

So far, it works.