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July 22
It's been another hot, humid day. I've spent a lot of time
inside enjoying the air conditioning. We've been getting terrible
rain storms at some point every day for about a week now so I'm sure
at some point the clouds will be rolling in. I like summer better
than winter, but these humid days are for the birds. It's so
miserable you just don't feel like doing much outside.
It's been a tough week around here. Tuesday my mom and I drove
Megan to the airport in Pittsburgh and put her on a plane to
Alabama. She bought a round-trip ticket and it's only supposed to
be a vacation to visit her favorite aunt and cousins, but as she
informed me last Friday.....she'll be turning 18 while she's there
and if she decides to stay there won't be anything we can do about
it. She's wanted to move to Alabama for a couple of years now and
since we visited in November it's ALL she's talked about. She
pretty much gave up on friends and a life here and focused on how
much better it would be down there.
I wouldn't have a problem with her going if she had a plan, but
she doesn't. The area she is in down there is very economically
depressed and she doesn't have any special skills to make her stand
out. She's staying with her cousin and his girlfriend, who are
living with her parents. We tried to tell her it wouldn't be right
to sponge off of them when the other two already are, but they keep
telling her to move there. She saw Tim's sister last night and they
are having dinner with her again tonight so I'm hoping maybe she
will be able to talk with her and make her see some sense.
Tim pulled some strings and is pretty sure he has a job lined
up for her if she comes back. A darned good job that a lot of folks
around here would give just about anything to have. It's checking
gas wells for Atlas Energy. She'd have to hurry up and get her
driver's license then she'd drive a company truck, get to ride
quads, and start out at $16/hour! Tim is trying to get his old
truck fixed up for her to use, too.
Oh well, you wish you could make them be smart and save them
from mistakes, but I guess we all have to find things out for
ourselves. I just wish she wasn't contemplating doing it 900 miles
from home.
This morning I rode along with Pastor Jim to look at a property
he liked for a home for our little fellowship. The space was okay
but it was going to take a lot of work to be usable and there was
very little parking with 3 or 4 big churches surrounding the place
and competing for the spaces. On a drive around the block I spotted
another property....a large house being used as a business. Our
agent called and got us in to see it. It's in good shape inside.
We'd just need to open it up a bit. Otherwise it didn't need any
work. It had plenty of parking, too. I think we are going to take
a couple of the others to see it soon.
My friend, Star, and I were going to pick blueberries at Mom's
husband's house up on the ridge, but when I called Star she wasn't
feeling well. We're going to go in the morning if Star is up to
it. In the meantime, I came home, had lunch, cleaned up the kitchen
and got a batch of Crystal Pickles started. I haven't made them for
nearly 10 years. They are so good, very sweet and crunchy, and our
favorite. It takes 8 days to pickle them, so next Friday I'll be
canning.......hopefully AFTER I get home from picking Megan up at
the airport. The same man who gave us the cukes also gave us quite
a few zucchini that I have to do something with tomorrow.
July 23
Another hot, humid day. The temperature this afternoon was
around 91 degrees and the heat index was around 100 degrees. It was
so humid you could have practically wrung the water out of the air.
It poured three different times this afternoon. It didn't rain long
either time, but it did rain very hard. I don't care what anyone
says.....temperatures of 100 and above are bad, but they are much
more bearable than when you throw in humidity. Humidity just weighs
you down and sucks the life out of you. We have the air
conditioning running all the time and while it's cool in the house
you're aware of the humidity.
Star didn't feel up to going to pick blueberries again today,
but said maybe tomorrow. I thought about it and decided to go this
morning anyway since I'd planned on it. I picked another 6
quarts....all off of
one
bush. Mom's husband, John, came out and picked with me. He also
got 6 quarts off a single bush. We might have picked more but it
just got too hot to take and it's uncomfortable as it is. John has
fenced the berries off with metal fencing and then covered the top
with a kind of plastic or nylon chicken wire. It's a must up in the
woods where he lives if you want to get any berries rather than feed
the wildlife, but all the rain has the wire sagging and you can't
stand up straight under it. It gets hard on the back. I had a nice
visit with John while we picked. I think I talked more with him
today than I ever have. I stayed to visit with Mom a little, too.
She got a cataract removed last week and tries to stay out of the
sun as much as she can till the doctor gives her the all clear. She
had one removed on the other eye last summer. Both times she seems
to have more trouble than anyone else I've known who's had it done.
I don't know if it's something with her eyes or just the doctor.
I froze the blueberries this afternoon and spent a good bit of
time on the internet looking for zucchini recipes. I found a couple
that I want to try, but in the end I've decided that tomorrow I'm
going to cube some of it and shred the rest and freeze it all for
later use. I did fry some up for supper, though....that's a
favorite of ours.
Tim actually went swimming with me after supper. That tells
you how hot it is more than anything else. He doesn't really like
to swim and rarely ever gets in, not even when the kids were younger
and begged him. Now if you see him in shorts.....the end is near!
Ha, ha!
July 24
Tim worked today. He won't be
missing many Saturdays for some time, I'm sure. Right now he is
finishing up a project and the last weeks are always crazy with
making sure everything gets done. After that he will be working the
overtime to help pay our taxes. When we came out of the bankruptcy
last year it was to a nasty surprise.....our property taxes, which
our attorney had said would be paid through the bankruptcy weren't.
They were only put on hold. So we owe 5 years plus the interest.
We tried but couldn't raise the money. We even tried getting a
loan, but with the new outlook on lending and the bankruptcy on our
history no one would even consider it. Tim finally called our
bankruptcy attorney and asked if there was anything he could do,
since he is the one who misadvised us. Thank goodness he did that,
because our attorney is friends with someone high up in the tax
bureau and they agreed to take us off the books and let us make
payments so the place wouldn't be put up for sheriff's sale.
Normally, payments can't be made on taxes more than two years old so
this is a huge favor and we can't miss or be late with our
payments. The only bad part is that the payments are pretty big
since we have to pay back 5 years worth of taxes in one year. We
are hoping Tim's Christmas bonus is back up where it was this year
so we can use it to finish paying the debt and get out from under
the payments.
I didn't do a lot this morning, just some reading and playing
on the computer. This afternoon I shredded all but two of the
really big zucchinis and froze them in bags with 2 cups (the usual
amount for recipes). The big ones I'm going to cut into cubes,
parboil, and freeze for soups and such.
There was just enough time to get showered and dressed when I
finished the zucchini to make it to church in time for services. I
walked in just as the opening music was starting. Tim wasn't able
to go because his brother asked him for help setting new kitchen
cabinets in the house they just bought. The church we rent space
from looked really awesome tonight. They'd had their Vacation Bible
School all week and the front of the church looked just like the
deck of a ship. I bet the kids had a wonderful time with that!
Decorations aside, it was a good time of worship and Pastor Jim's
message was good. He is such a good speaker and teacher and always
has a way of making things so clear. I didn't stay for the
fellowship dinner afterward because Star was finally able to go pick
blueberries.
Star was a little late getting to my place so it was after 7:00
by the time we made it up to John's place. I picked another 4
quarts. I'll freeze 2 tomorrow and I promised a friend from church
some, so will give her the other 2 quarts. Star probably picked
about 6 quarts as she picked a little bit longer than I did. She is
hoping to get to go again this week. On our way back out the road
we saw that one of John's neighbors had a little stand set up by the
road. It was nearly dark but we got out to look. They were selling
fresh produce. We both got bags of green beans for $1 and Star
bought some gourds for $1. They had something they called winter
zucchini for 25 cents each, but I think I have all the zucchini I
want. They said they'd have cucumbers, broccoli and several other
things coming this week so I'll be going back to look again. They
are just a family trying to make a little extra and the prices are
good.
Megan called today. I talked to her for a while even though it
was hard because there is very weak cell phone signal where she is
at in Alabama. She finally admitted that she doesn't plan to come
home. She considers herself moved there and since she has her
clothes isn't too worried about when she'll get the rest of her
things. Tim is hoping the fun of it will wear off after a while
when the reality of working and paying bills and not having money to
do things sets in. Right now she's still got that "vacation"
mentality. It's been hard for me (Tim, too) to accept. I think
it's because she is so young and really doesn't have a plan of any
kind. If she at least had a plan it would be easier to let go. As
it is, we can't help but worry a great deal. Tomorrow is her 18th
birthday.....it will be a tough day.
July 25
Tim and I met friends from church for lunch. We went to a
smorgasboard in Somerset. I had been there once before as a kid,
but most of the others had never been there. What a lot of food!
On Sundays you can choose to pay for just the brunch buffet or pay
for the dinner buffet and get the brunch with it. We all opted for
the dinner buffet so had two full buffets to choose from. It was
priced very reasonably, too, which was a nice surprise....though our
friends treated everyone.
We got to talk to Megan a couple of times today. She is living
with Tim's sister now, which we are glad about, but how that came to
be is not so good. She had been staying with her cousin and his
girlfriend at her parents' home. She'd been telling us they were
"crazy" but nice. Today "nice" went out the window and she ended up
in the middle of a big domestic incident. The police came.
Whatever the children's agency in Alabama is was on the way to get a
younger girl in the home. The dad fled out the window because he
thought he had warrants out on him. Our nephew got into it with the
dad trying to protect the younger girl. Megan didn't say so, but we
think she was pretty scared....that was all new to her. She said
they wanted her to stay and she asked why on earth she'd want to do
that because normal people, real families don't fight like that.
Tim's sister's ex-husband went and got Megan. We owe him a big
thank you for that! Anyway, she is okay, but what a way to end up
spending your 18th birthday. Maybe this will help head her back
home?
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