Category Archives: blue funks

Tom, Tom, the Tiler’s Son

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Jack gets over the line again – –

We are having our main bathroom re-modeled and the guy in charge is called Tom – hence the title of this post.

Wendy had a recent disappointment and as a consolation prize we agreed to get her the nearest thing to the bathroom of her dreams as possible. We did some searching around for potential folk to undertake the work and settled on ‘Tom’.

The trouble is that we quickly discovered that he’s a ‘bletherskite’ – an excellent Scots word for someone who just won’t stop talking. But he mostly talks about anything except the job in hand.

On the odd occasion when he randomly inserts something into the conversation about the job it’s mostly incomprehensible to me. That’s because despite my background in construction, my technical language is from Scotland and it’s very different. For instance, I talked about the stoppers and he talked about the drain and we went about ten minutes waiting for each other to get to the point.

So – a fair bit of mess-communication ensued! Part of that was when he planned to start demolishing the existing stuff. He messaged me mentioning ‘demo’ – well, to a child of the 1960s a demo is when you sit in the road to protest something! When we discovered on Monday that he planned to start the next day we went into a panic because all the bathroom cupboards and closets were still stuffed full. Wendy had just held a yard sale and we had some empty boxes…..

So most of Monday we were desperately removing lots of stuff including things we didn’t know we had or hadn’t seen for years. Then finding where on earth to stash it for the next two weeks. At least we hope it is two weeks. Tom said “15 days” and we can’t translate if that is 15 working days, meaning three weeks????

But Tom and his helper are, right now as I write this, bashing away at the ‘demo’ and I’m hopeful that everything will turn out to be as we want in the end. More correctly, as Wendy wants it.

I’ll keep you posted of course over the next couple of weeks, and yes, we are taking offers of places to shower. Tom has just come in and I asked him about taps.

He cocked his head and said, “You play the trumpet? I came in here to talk to you about faucets.”

But where will we get a bath or a shower in the meantime – – –

The Privilege of being Busy

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Our last blog was Sept. 22 because that’s just before Jack went to Boston on a holiday with beloved friends. I stayed home because I’m going to a conference that starts Monday and somebody needed to watch Bruce, the cats, and the chickens on our sweet little homestead.

It’s gonna be okay

On Monday the garbage disposal went out. No problem, I can bail the sink.

On Tuesday, driving home from a meeting two hours away, my vehicle began making horrible sounds and got left in a town an hour away. A friend drove me home. (Thanks Donnamarie and it’s a wonderful thing to have friends who will make round trips for you.) Neighbors across the street, fighting their own battles with serious health issues, took time out to run over and let our doggie Bruce out because I was stranded so long. It was unexpected, catching up with Donnamarie after not seeing her for over a year. So pleasant, even if the ride was forced by difficult circumstances.

On Wednesday I drove our farm truck to an awards ceremony in a posh location. I resisted the urge to park my sheep-smelling vehicle in valet, but oh it was a temptation. I went to the posh location because one of our volunteers at the Inman Village Community Nourishment Project was receiving an award for being awesome and running a food program over the summer when we didn’t have any student volunteers to do it.

On Thursday I sent query letters on my first serious piece of fiction to four agents, and covered our garden in prep for winter. And had ice cream for supper, in a waffle cone.

Today I am headed back to Inman in a rental–they didn’t have one Wednesday which is why I drove the farm truck–to run our monthly outreach of free food, fun crafts, and listening to questions the Inman Village residents have about access to services. And hopefully answer them. I was able to get the rental because another beloved friend picked me up at home and took me to the rental place, despite being up to her eyebrows in care needs for her own extended family, including three elders and an accident-prone brother. It was lovely to catch up with Nora, in forced circumstances again, but we sat in the rental lot and talked for 15 minutes, just filling each other in on grace under pressure, aka Adulting 101.

Everything that happened this week was hard, and everything is based on something wonderful and resulted in something wonderful. I have a back-up vehicle. We have awesome volunteers. I can afford a garbage disposal, and chickens on my little one-acre homestead. My husband got to spend a week with dearly beloved friends from his home country. Covering the garden started with annoyance at wind gusts and curious chickens trapping themselves under the tarp, and ended with me laughing so hard I had to sit down as the chickens danced with the fluttering plastic.

Gratitude is an amazing framework. Not comparison, not denying our feelings, but being grateful for what we have.