And Life Goes On

I had decided at some point, losing Jess would be a bookend in our life.  A thing we can forever put 'before' and 'after' around.  Instead, it's more of a turning of the page to a new chapter.  Life isn't neat enough to give you many definites, it's a messy and disorganized business.

Ben has turned 18.  In a move that would shock my own mother, I have managed to keep them all alive until adulthood.  I had my only hesitation of the year when he and Chan took off on the afternoon of his birthday to navigate the Interstate together.  He wasn't born until after 9 p.m.  That little voice threw out a what if.  Oh, little voice!  I wish I could smash you into a paste and spread you out in the summer sun until you were dry and crackled and eventually blew away.

We are getting the new roof put on, waiting for the materials to be delivered.  Estimates have ranged from 'OMG' to 'WTF'.  I had no idea a simple metal roof on a fairly small and uncomplicated house could run $12,000.  I'm talking galvalume, like on a barn.  Not hand polished bronze here.  They cut it AT the factory, they only have to slap it up there and screw it down.  DANG.  We had to get a loan for it, even going the cheapest route possible.  Well, not cheapest.  I did get the 50-year warranty stuff.  I don't want to even think about that roof again.  Other than "ooh, shiny!"

My father did a brief stint in the hospital after having a stroke.  He's checked out all clear, no damage or blockage or issues, no virus or anything they can detect that caused it after the fact.  Despite being 79 and never having taken the first round of medicine (other than for colds, no doubt) he's on a daily blood pressure medication as there was a spike in his BP just after and his, like mine, is usually quite low.

We have started a new family project, well, South Cumberland has started a new project headed up by everyone's favorite park ranger Park.  Matt took the kids and Alex up today for the groundbreaking.  I wanted to go, but Daddy was still in the hospital and I was on backup Butterbean duty.  You remember Butterbean-my Maltipoo nemesis brother?  I was the favorite for 40 years.  Then Daddy got Butterbean.  He has 900-to-1 photos of that dog over childhood photos of me.

Anyway, the project is one I have been yammering about for 3 years, it's the reconstruction of the old CCC cabins and building!  I've done a ton of research, I am really excited about the whole thing and hate I missed the FIRST DAY of the project.  But there are years of it ahead of us, I doubt it will be done soon.

The state elected a Democrat to Congress.  I'm still not even sure what to say beyond Yippee!

Ben's Christmas concert is Monday, then the next week Matt will have a few days off for the holiday, then it will be a new year. 

I've taken no photos, done no new hikes just the same old routes I have walked a hundred times if I've even bothered to leave the house at all.  It's all been routine-running the errands I have always run, taking Ben to music and picking him up, getting dog food, cat food, more toilet paper, time for another oil change.  I feel mired in it all, ready for something else.  Ready for a new chapter. 

Small Comforts

Outside, the wind is whipping the rain around.  I hope it rains for hours and hours.  That's what refills the creeks so I can go backpacking next week!

Inside, I have made garlicky bread and veggie soup for lunch and have cooked cauliflower and turkey tenderloin for dinner later.  We are all full.  The house is dark, just a few lights on.  The boys are playing a game together, murmuring and laughing.  Chan is curled up chatting with friends online, enjoying a day off.  There are a couple of fans on, moving the air around.  It's a very good day. 

Earlier today, Ben went to his orchestra class and I went and walked 3 miles before the rain started.  The trail was tougher than expected and I was sweating.  I was in Chan's car because Matt has my van, with my wallet inside.  His car is at the shop for a front end noise that turned out to be rough brake pads, so not another $250 repair for the 4th month in a row! Chan had a small stack of quarters and after my walk, I drove over to a drink machine only to discover it was a Coke machine.  BUT LO AND BEHOLD there was a Diet Pepsi in the silver can option.  It took the money and dispensed an icy can with zero drama.  I may have done a dance.  Thank goodness for second-hand soda machines that the owner can stock whatever way.

I can only drink diet Pepsi because it does not have aspartame.  Aspartame makes my muscles and joints HURT, I don't know why.  Once I get moving I limber up, but the first minute or two EVERY TIME I GET UP my joints feel like they are either going to seize up or give out knees and hips being the worst.  That's zero fun in the middle of the night when all I want to do is run pee before I wake up enough to just lay there until the alarm goes off.  Instead, I hobble.  It took the better part of a year to figure it out because I had cut out all kinds of other foods first.  Mainly dairy and gluten.  That sucked, lemme tell ya.  It wasn't until after a backpacking trip that I realized I was moving just fine despite being for real sore from muscle use.  The only thing I didn't have that week was-diet soda. 

Anyway, loathe to give it up totally because-that would make sense-I simply started reading about what in diet drinks makes people have stiff joints.  And viola!  I can drink Diet Pepsi is the moral of this story.  I drink water, too.  I drink water from creeks, which is why I am liking this rain.

I have been bummed this whole month, October is our Big Trip month-for the past 10 years, we have been gone somewhere awesome this month.  DC, Blue Ridge Parkway, St. Louis, Cayman, Savannah, Florida, the OBX twice, Disney, Buffalo River...I don't have anything on the radar until nearly the end of the month and that's iffy because it involves taking Ben and his buddies off for a few days and Elan just started working.  So we aren't even sure if that's going to be a thing. I wanna go somewhere! 

In other comforts news, I have ordered yet another camping pillow to try.  I have the pack, pad, tent, and even camping hammock that I want, but that pillow...I want something HUGE like a bed pillow, but there's no backpacking pillow that big.  They are all slightly larger than a tictac container and not any softer.  The pad/pillow combo plus head results in a squirting action in which the pillow goes 'feeyuuum' and bounces off the tent wall as soon as I lay down.  I spend an hour each night locating the pillow and getting it back underneath my head.  Slightly deflated helps, but does not solve the problem.  This one has a cover. 

I did find out that I can cut down my too long pad and iron the ends closed.  So I may soon have a pad that works in the tent AND the hammock.  As soon as I get up the nerve.

The Week 8/52 & 9/52

Put in 7 miles with Karen on Friday, we had so much fun!  Karen wore her new Osprey pack (ours match!) and we fiddled with it until she was very happy with the fit.  Hurrah!  I have not even done that with my own pack yet, the one day I loaded it to try out, I pulled a neck muscle picking it up, then the food was still in boxes, so they poked my kidneys.  I had it loaded for a full week of no resupply-clothes, food, water (well, 3 liters) stove, fuel, pot, cup, light, rain gear, tent, bag, pad, down jacket, hat, maps, camera, batteries...it was 33 pounds and toooooo heavy for my liking.  I was glad she was loving hers, I am hoping for a better plan next time I haul mine out! haha

found these at Big Lots, bought...a lot of them.  SO yummy!

deeeeer

Afterward, I went to meet Andrea at Ditto Landing and it was flooded!

We got in a couple miles anyway, then had dinner at Tazikis.

A weekend trip to Hobby Lobby for more art supplies for the Chan netted me some half off figurines to place along the trail.  

Lots of trail work and the occasional stab at trail work that ends with just hiking around.

This is the top of the log road I want to open back up, that's about 4 afternoons of just burning the downed stuff.  It's been so much work, but a really good way to sneak in some exercise.  After I get the loop at the north end done, that will add a serious climb.  It's 600 feet at the confluence where the property line is and it's 1000 at the cliff where the campsite is.  The house is about 200 feet higher than that, so a good elevation change!  The trail is a mile long now end to end, so a 2 mile walk to do it all.  So far. Going for 3 for now and planning to add 2 more miles next winter.  I don't want to disturb the critters too much by moving brush around, snakes in particular!

I needed to sit at the top a bit and plan where to start the trail down.

Jessie likes the contemplation time.

That's a dog smooch IN my backpack.  Nosers!

The start of the north loop path, so far I have just been moving large fallen things and rocks out of the path.  That tree was too heavy!

Salamanders are waking up!
Don't touch with bare hands, they absorb through their skins and can die from the crap we slather on ourselves.

On leap day, we returned Kurt's car and went geocaching so Matt could get a special leap year badge.  On the way home (all 5 of us crammed in Matt's tiny car) I snapped some pics out the window.

Lovely!

And that's it.
I got Ben registered for the next school year.  We talked it over and are TIRED of homeschooling.  He's going to work at getting his last few credits done early, so he can graduate next May instead of 2018.  So, without realizing it at the time, I enrolled us in our final year as homeschoolers!

So, I only have to plan 6 more events in my role as AC and I am DONE.  I am nearly giddy with the relief of the end being in sight.  I have planned so many things and led so many events and outings over the past 16 years.  I will be glad to be at the end of it all.  Fittingly, my last homeschooling event will be the May campout in 2017.

Warm Days Outdoors

 Monday was the usual running Jake to PoPo Practice.  I spent the time getting photos printed at Walgreens.  They didn't listen to a thing I said and when I went to pick them up, the guy I talked to was gone for the day.  Grrrr.  179 photos of NOT how I wanted them.  And...that was the worst thing all week.  So, pretty good week!

Tuesday we had a really bizarre adventurous day with Katy and kids.  We met at the park to walk on the greenway and play a while.  As soon as we arrived, we watched a crew set up to film a Redstone bank commercial.  Then Katy let loose her hounds in the dog park-which was FLOODED.  We discovered (after not looking very hard) a busted water pipe, so she called the city.  They arrived and fixed it within minutes!

The dogs were soaked and muddy, so off we went to walk.  We got in maybe a mile, hehehe.  The kids wanted to poke around off the trail and found a backpack in the water!  They fished it out and Katy opened a side pocket to discover some business cards with a name and number and she left a voice mail.

The guy showed up to get it a little later!  It had been stolen from his car.

We kept walking until we reached another park, then went back to get some lunch.

Ollie Powered scootering!

I went to Taco Bell to get lunch for us, it took half an hour!! SLOOOOOW service.

I am not eating anything fried at all to see if that helps the tummy.  So far, so good!
I like the cantina bowls.  :)

The kids played while I was gone, then we ate lunch and everyone decided to head to the other park, so Chan and I went to the library super quick between location changes.

She grabbed half the anime section and ran for the self check kiosk while I grabbed 5 various nature study books.  One, Southern Sanctuary, is an entire year's worth of photos and observations from a nature preserve in Huntsville!

Jake called to say he had to work over, so we had time for a quick game of soccer!

On Wednesday, we laid low and Thursday we had lunch with Amanda and the kids went to ballroom dance and attended the Christmas party.  One of the boys there has set his sights on Chan and (hehehe) asked Jake via Facebook for permission to ask her out.  Jake said, "Go for it, best of luck!"

I, with no formal training in prophecy, foresee said boy being turned down.

Poor kid, do the rainbows and Pride gear not register?

After dumping my kids on someone else discovering both kids were set up for the afternoon and making sure Gina didn't mind running them partway home, I actually mowed a trail through the pasture.  That was some major work, I was sweating so hard it was running into my eyes.  ack!  It needs more work, but I got a good start on it.

Between that and walking to the creek the other day, Murphy has decided that the fence is just a suggestion and has been getting out nonstop.  I have gone out and moved fencing, added fencing, threaded wire into X's on any gap wider than 4 inches and what he does is walks along the fence pushing his head into squares.  He walks along one row (it's field fencing, like for horses because we had 2 90 pound dogs when we set it all up) and tests every gap, then moves up a row and tests that, then back along the 3rd row up over and over until he finds a spot he can get through.

I have posted him for rehoming, I am NOT having a repeat of Zephyr in which a dog goes missing and I never ever know why or where.  So, if you know someone looking for a house dog, I have one.

Nia can't be moved off the bed because she will freeze to death.  She's in her 'but it's WINTER' mode.

She and Murph are eating a TON of food!  oh my gosh.

That's it for this week!  No holiday plans, but hoping to get some hiking in between the rain chances.  Matt and Jake will have 5 days off starting Wednesday!

All I Can Smell is Hydrocortisone

A poem, by me.

Okay, so I have either a bug bite or a scratch JUST inside my nostril and it ITCHES and it's started swelling and it's nearly all I have thought about for the past 2 days.  Mainly, I think about the discomfort and dwell on the vague feeling that I may have contracted some disease that would end in me having a fake nose as my real one will fall off.  I have a good idea of the nose I would rather have, but obviously, the interim seems super gross.  And potentially painful.  Both things I don't enjoy.

So, I have been putting cortisone cream in my nose to battle the itch and swelling factor.  No joy yet, but soon.  I hope.

Now for some pics!

I was meeting Karen to walk, so I did my hair like Agent Smith. ha!

I do not know what this tree is.

Yet.

We walked the north end and back, I like the way the buildings NEEEEEERLY align.

It's a 12 mile there-and-back walk, over half of it uphill headed south, so it's a nice leg-stretching workout.

Karen fell about 2.5 miles in to the walk!  She stumbled long enough that we both thought she was going to get her footing, but over she went, and facing downhill at that.  I felt AWFUL about not trying to catch her, but I am pretty sure that would have ended even worse and we both would have been hurt, likely with a knee in someones eye socket.

Still, she ended up with some really good bruises. I made her lay on the ground a few minutes while the shock wore off and she assessed the damage.  She was trying to pop right back up to keep going.  She had taken Aspirin that morning for her knee and BLED, I thought we were going to end up at the ER, the blood pooled around her like a crime scene.  I was considering jogging to the nearest house.

She was doing MUCH better than I was, though I was trying to be all cool about it.  Panic never helps, but my inner monkey was dancing up a storm while Worse Case Scenario Esther cranked out some tunes on the brain organ.  Most of those tunes had words like 'exposed bone fragments' in them.  eeeeee

She sat up and started wiping off the blood and picking out the gravel.  I FINALLY got the nerve to look, with that 'rearranged gut' feeling that comes with the sure knowledge of oog ahead.  But it was this circle about the size of a dime.  Yeah, she'd scraped herself in some little scratches here and there and I could see it was already bruising and swelling, but I did not see a single internal organ.  I put some Neosporin on a bandaid, covered the wound and we kept walking.

At Veto

We had lunch at Chick-Fil-A and plan to go again ASAP!

Matt has been working late, I don't see that changing soon, but the puppies are really worried when he does not come in by 6.   They pace and stare down the driveway and are both listless until he finally arrives, then they both act like idjits.

Two of the four houses are well underway.

There is so much noise coming from over there, all day every day.  His grandmother lives RIGHT BY the site, just to the right of that bush in the shot.  Poor woman.

On our backpacking trip 2 weekends ago, Matt got into...something.  Chiggers for sure, maybe mosquitoes as well.  He's MISERABLE.  I have 3 bites still around, he still looks like this.  My bites ITCH, I can't imagine how much he must be itching.  I have rubbed every ointment and cream we have for every skin ailment there is and he still wakes up in the night, digging.  He's taken all kinds of allergy meds, too.  It's head to toe, too.  All over his back and arms.  :( 

Murph has stopped clawing the door half down to get in, but he does this hilarious staring thing.  Nia is playing it cool, but as soon as the door is opened, she flies in.  See the streaks on the glass?  They fuel up at the water pool and then come dribble.  I wash that door 5 or 6 times a week. 

Chilling in their chairs

He's a cute dog.  I just wish he were a little better behaved.

Chan has pink hair.

My new to me tent

I know I just bought one back a few months ago, but this one is just for me.  Matt really likes hammock camping and it's not fair to ask him to haul half my tent AND his hammock and I would rather not carry 6 pounds of 2-man tent alone, so I got this TINY one man tent that weighs under 3 pounds.  It started POURING before I got it all set up, so my Big Agnes pad is wet. It's also too wide for the tent!

It's a diamond shaped tent and uses LOTS of stakes, I only had the ends staked before the rain started, so it's a little slack.

I am not sure I super like it, but it will work for now.  I know I can resell it for what I paid without any trouble at all.  Plus, if I get REALLY adventurous, I can go without the tent and just use the fly.  That's just over a pound.  I am not super interested in sleeping without a tent, but I imagine at some point, I will toughen up.  hahaha  Or get tired of hauling so much weight in my pack and start looking at what I can leave.

My base weight-pack, bag, pad and shelter-runs around 14 pounds.  I read a guy today who said his was 4 pounds.  FOUR.  I know a newer pack would shed at least 3 pounds off my load, but he must be sleeping in a folded sheet under a poncho on a super thin pad and carrying it all in a kindergarten backpack. I enjoy being comfortable.

Anyway, I spend a good bit of time weighing my weight options.  I could shave off nearly a pound by going back to my smaller pad, but I love the space. I will have to upgrade my pack soon, it's over 20 years old and the zippers are getting sticky and the seams are starting to pull apart in a couple places and it's just plain HEAVY, over 5 pounds empty.  I could spend $100 and lose a pound on my hammock camping weight and $250 would get another pound off my sleeping bag.  It's all just so insane.  I have been really careful of the budget and have bought everything used or on clearance.  I have put less than $300 in my whole set-up, including the hammock and BOTH tents, which I won't keep all of anyway.  But you can shell out thousands if you have it to shell.

If I just hike next to water all the time and only eat seaweed sheets and forgo comfy camp shoes and all clothes, including clean underwear, I can trim off 15 pounds right there.  Food, water and clothing are heavy.  In gear, lightweight is either unsafe and misery-making or $$$$$.  Or sometimes both.  Grandma Gatewood hiked the whole AT with a shower curtain, wearing tennis shoes and carrying a bag over one shoulder that she restocked along the way with canned tuna.   Not something I want to emulate.  I will never be that tough.  And I bet if she had a Big Agnes pad, she'd figure a way to haul that puppy.

The two waiting slots.  UGH I so dread that whole enterprise.

Murph waiting for Daddy

Murphy hopes Daddy gets a new job soon.

Coming soon to a sleeping bag liner near...me!

It's SOOO buttery soft and warm.

I went to get 'anything' in fleece that was a good price.  It's going inside a bag I am making, so it does not matter what it looks like.  But I found this and loved it!  And it was on sale from $24.99 a yard to $3.27 a yard!  It's so warm, much warmer than my current fleece bag!