It's raining, it's pouring!

And yes, my "old man," despite being six years younger than me, has spent a lot of time this weekend snoring. Heehee. Can't really do anything outside when it's pouring buckets and making the yard a soupy mess, so might as well take a long nap, since the rain is soothing enough to make even me sleepy. So, no, we really didn't get a lot done this week, even with him being off work.

It was nice enough for a few days that Quentin did get some more trees cut down, especially in the area we plan on using as a midden, to bury all the things we can re-use, burn or scrap out. We figure since it's all been laying on the ground this long, just bury it under dirt and gravel and plant some wildflowers or clover or something on the pile to keep the dirt in place. Can't do any more damage to the place than it's already had done to it with that stuff laying around, and it'll be cheaper to bury it than to take it to the landfill, and have to pay the dump fees and the gas to haul it there, especially with all the gravel/dirt ridges left behind on the mountain road every time the graders come through, which is about two or three times a year. And since there's a ridge right across the road from the end of the driveway, it makes it super easy to haul up a bucket or three at a time of the stuff for burying things. I can't help it, I'm inherently cheap and lazy. Quentin says I'm not cheap, just very thrifty, and I have often joked throughout the years that I'm lazy because I like to do things right the first time, so I get to avoid re-doing things.

Quentin also took some lumber and built sides for the trailer that slot into the little square slots on the sides. It makes it so much more useful than just being a flatbed, so now he can haul bigger loads of scrap or wood around, as long as he can figure out what's going on with the hitch assembly on the tongue of the trailer where it goes over the ball. Something in the mechanism is acting funny, and he plans on spending the drier parts of today sitting on a tarp out there while I'm at "McQuackers" trying to get it apart and fix it. More than likely, it just needs a good shot of WD-40, but you never know. Could just need a new bolt and nut, too ... he's got to tear it apart and figure out what's wrong so he can fix it and then we'll go from there.

Work's kept me pretty busy. I leave in the dark to go to work, and this whole last week, despite longer days of sunshine, I've gotten home after dark every day but Friday. It's kind of depressing, because I hardly ever see daylight right now, and there's so much I want to get done, but I'm too pooped for anything but a quick dinner when I get home. Even on Friday, I was so tired from the long hours that I ended up not getting anything done outside. But it's only February, I keep reminding myself, and it will change. Hours will drop eventually, weather will warm up and days will last longer. And I'm truthfully very grateful we're here instead of still back in our tiny apartment, because the commute, even in bad weather or heavy traffic is only 40 minutes tops, instead of 90, and only 22 miles instead of nearly 100, one way. So it makes it so much easier to not be tired and to get a few things done around here in the way of indoors chores even at night. Even if I get to do nothing anyhow, because Q's usually got it all done already, it makes it so nice to come home to a clean house and hubby and the boys (the kitties), and not have to do anything but kick off my boots and settle down with the laptop to goof off.

I'm getting some knitting done yet, because I do take it with me to the laundromat on Saturdays when we run errands, which generally takes most of the day, and then on Sunday morning, I take my knitting with me to church, where I knit during the service. We have sort of an informal knitting group going on during services, which is kind of funny. We don't disturb anybody, we sit in the back, we pay attention, and we take knitting or crochet with us that's essentially mindless work, like my afghan, or another lady who's working on sewing together granny squares for an afghan, or the lady who brings along a pair of socks every week (though how she can follow some of her patterns AND the service is beyond me, that's a bit too complicated even as long as I've been knitting, which is over 30 years!). I still need to work on rewriting a lot of my patterns for doll clothes and baby things so that I can save them as PDFs and put them up for sale on Ravelry, which I haven't done anything with for a while. Between work and sleep and the farm, there hasn't been a lot of time for that for a few months! I'll be glad when hours go down a tad so I can do more things here at the house rather than spending all my time mutilating turkeys, driving, eating and sleeping, lol. But at least I'm able to keep the bills paid, so Quentin can get all the muscle work done around here.

We did get a chance yesterday when it cleared up for a little bit to go out behind the Merlot to the old horse pasture and walk the fenceline. Sadly, most of the posts and wire will have to be replaced, which means we'll likely invest in horse fencing rather than barbed wire for it, so there goes my idea of weaving brush and such into the existing barbed wire to solidify it and make it somewhat sturdier. There's so many trees downed over the wire, and so many places where the bottommost of the three strands is so high off the ground, it's a wonder that the horses that were being kept there by the last occupant here didn't manage to get out of the pasture. And who in their right mind uses barbed wire with horses, anyhow? Horses are inherently dumb in certain circumstances, and barbed wire is one of them. I can't tell you how many times I've seen or read of a horse that got caught up in barbed wire and ended up tearing themselves to shreds because the pain of the barbs terrified them and caused them to fight, just getting themselves tangled up and torn up worse. So the wire has to go, possibly a new load of posts has to go in, and then we invest in horse fencing. A hundred-foot chunk of 5' tall horse fencing is only $180, which is a lot for the size we need to fence in, but it'll be worth it in the long run to know stock won't get out very darned easily.

There's also a ton of downed trees for Quentin to cut up out of the pasture, and rocks to grub out. I'm amazed that the three horses I know were kept there over time didn't break a leg on the freaking things, there's so many rocks and boulders out there.

Quentin can't get to a dentist for his broken tooth (because the local dentists want too much up front for the work, which mostly isn't covered by the insurance) which is pretty silly, but there's not a dentist around here who feels comfortable dealing with getting the stump of a tooth out of his gum, so it has to clear up and work its way out on it's own. It's happened before, and it was a long-term nightmare for him. Eventually, he had to do a "Marine extraction," which basically means waiting till the thing is loose enough on its own that he can grab it and pull it out. He was in the Marines, and he's just as tough as can be from it. It scared me when he did that, but I got my revenge, haha. He forgot what salt water in an open wound does, and I had him gargle afterwards with a strong salt water solution to kill germs. He about screamed, but he said later it sure killed any pain from having to do his own dental work. We solved the salt water problem yesterday on the way home, for when this one comes out and in the meantime, so he doesn't have to chug a hanful of ibuprofen for the pain.

We stopped at the liquor store and got a pint of Jim Beam Devil's Cut. Now I lke a good, strong alcoholic brew myself, being  mostly German, English and Gaelic (Scots, Irisn AND Welsh) ... I often say that American beers are just like drinking flavored water, because there's nothing to them. Unfortunately, I didn't inherit the genetic ability to HANDLE said strong liquor, and half a wine cooler puts me weaving down the hall to the bathroom, bouncing off the walls all the way. Genetically, I do have the ability to drink the strong stuff and not have a reaction to it, though Quentin and I both tried a swallow of the stuff to see what it tastes like. It's an excellent American whiskey, drunk cold and neat, though he sure does make funny faces when it hits him. Me, I just felt it go down smooth and warm me innards a bit. His reaction, "Hey, no toothache!" So we agreed, as strong as the stuff is, it's being kept handy for medicinal purposes right now for his toothache. Plus, heaven forbid he have a major accident that requires a trip to the emergency room but it's awful nasty-looking and such (like, say, a minor accident with the chainsaw that leaves him with a gaping slice in an appendage), out will come the whiskey to disinfect it and clear it out till he gets to a doctor.

I have an interest in brewing, too, so he knows that down the line, I'll be doing some homemade beer and wine-making, and a lot of it will be kept. Not so much for entertaining, though that's a big purpose, too, but if the refuse hits the rotary oscillator, I want to have some of that on hand for medical purposes and trade goods. I'm a decent jackleg doctor and a very good herbalist (I really need to get my medical herb garden going again) in that I can sew up a wound, set a broken arm/leg, wrap a sprain, etc. I can't do major stuff, so major stuff requires a "real doctor" in the event of TEOTWAWKI, or someone's going to have a big problem. So keeping some liquor on hand right now for medical purposes is a good thing. If he has to take a swig of the Jim Beam once in a while to keep his tooth from hurting, I'd rather he do that and smell like whiskey than end up tearing up his innards and thinning his blood out to nothing from having to seriously OD on the ibuprofen.

Now we did have a big problem with UPS this past week. Somebody, we have no clue who, sent me a package via UPS. I've never had a big problem with them before, but this time I really had a big problem. Apparently, someone sent me a package that someone over 21 had to be here to sign for. Unfortunately for us, Quentin's off trying to find work or odd jobs to do, and I'm at the plant when they tried the first couple of times to get it to us. And because it "requires" a signature, the driver won't just leave it on the deck. So I called UPS to see about having it redelivered. They won't deliver it outside of weekdays and ONLY within a three-day window, and they have to be consecutive. So the representative said sure, we can set it up to be waiting for you at a pickup location. However, the pickup location in Harrison is some business that's only open during the week, and only for a few hours. They can't seem to find the UPS STORE in Harrison which is open on Saturdays and later during the week, so that we could pick it up easier. I had to call the store to find out how to get ahold of the place where the package WAS supposed to be, and then from Tuesday through Thursday, the place says it's not there. I called UPS back Thursday night and got a big runaround. Oh, they can "assure" me the package is there, despite the place saying they have no record of it, it's there, they know it's there, and then I find out that because our drivers licenses don't match the delivery address, Quentin can't pick it up for me. I'd have to take time off work to go get it myself! Well, I asked to speak to the representative's supervisor, who was about as American as the first guy (ie, it's a call center in India), and kept going, "I have to inform you that ..." I finally got mad and told him, "I have to inform YOU that you have two choices on me getting this package. One is to let me give my husband a note to pick it up even if his ID doesn't have the correct address, and the other is to deliver it to the house and leave it without a signature because nobody's HOME during the day. Which is it going to be." The guy still wanted to give me the runaround, so I asked to speak to HIS supervisor, who apparently was "busy" and would "call back in fifteen minutes." Needless to say, the callback didn't happen and the package didn't get delivered, either. So one of my chores here today while I'm online is to drop a customer service email to UPS and gripe at them, as well as to get the name and address of the CEO and write them a letter this weekend and gripe at them. It may be "company policy" to require ID to match, but I know darned good and well that there are workarounds for when it doesn't or someone can't be home to sign for a package, and I was just getting stuck talking to people who have no freaking clue about real customer service. In all my years in the accounting field, if I'd tried that kind of rigamarole with a client without having IRS or State regulations to hand to back up what I said, I'd've been losing clientele right and left. UPS, with this, lost my business. I'll use DHL or FedEx from here on out, or the Postal Service. The latter may not be all the great, and sometimes they can all be more expensive to ship things, but at least I've not had package delivery issues like this with any of those three. I have always liked UPS, but this situation is ridiculous. (Yes, that long paragraph qualifies as my gripe for the week. The whole situation was EXTREMELY GRRRRRR-some.)

In the long run,though, it's so nice to be up here. With the late winter rains that we so desperately need pouring down regularly now, in the next few weeks, things will stop being so brown and will start greening up again, and the place will look a bit less like a trash dump and a bit more like a "cabin in the woods" again, giving us a chance to work our butts off clearing out more deadwood and junk trees and brush over the warm  months. I may not get a garden in this year either, but I'm at least getting some seeds and will see what I can do about some containers and planting in them. It's a start, if not much of one, but it's a start. It's kind of odd sometimes to think about all of my Gentle Readers who live elsewhere, in different climates and your weather. I know some of you are in the Southern Hemisphere, and are heading into your fall and winter weather, while we're heading into spring and summer, so it's got to be odd for you to hear about my weather being "late winter rains" while yours is "early fall," and likely still pretty warm! But now it's off to check email, and do some goofing off, and finding some more games to bring home to play offline at home, so until next week, here's hoping your weather is the way you want and need it to be.