That’s like an eight-year-old boy. Yup.
He’s really growing up nicely, learning his role as guardian, learning that ANNIE is QUEEN OF ALL….
Yesterday spent most of the day, unexpectedly, as plumber’s helper: The time had come for the stack vent to go up through the roof, and the plumber reluctantly (after all my hopeful promises about hiring a roofing person fell through) brought his rickety aluminum extension ladder over and we tackled the heights (me by staying on terra firma and bracing the ladder).
He eventually got a hole drilled through the sheet metal and planking in the right spot, and together we leveled the final piece, glued it in, chocked it and braced it, and then he was back up on the roof to attach the “boot,” a rubber seal around the vent pipe and hole.
This all took most of the day, and if (plumber’s) family ever reads this post, I am to deny he was ever near our roof. Luckily, it is the first and last time such work will be needed. Nobody was injured in the making of this blog entry.
Then we went and had a superbly civilized dinner with neighbors up the road, who had graciously introduced themselves to us, and at this first opportunity opened their beautiful home to us. Just down the road about 2-3 driveways, in Thorndike, it’s an awesome log home that they (Jon and Martha — really) put up themselves, and it’s everything such a home should be. Plus, they recently remodeled the kitchen, so we had additional inspiration for everything we’re currently working on.
A lovely time and delicious dinner ensued — and how wonderful to begin to grow our community here, to have acquaintances to get advice and contacts from, to learn about local politics and neighborhood history from… not to mention the many personal connections and simpatico values and interests we find we share. Really great.
And we got to sit in real chairs at a real table with real china…….! So thank you to Jon and Martha.
Today we retrenched a bit (again) and made a series of calls to roofer-type builders, each of whom eventually returned our call but could do nothing more than give us a new name. As of this writing, the fourth in this series of references is due to come by tomorrow afternoon and look at the eaves and fascia with us, and discuss the project.
Also in the morning we successfully put our recycling to the curb, following the Byzantine directions of the town for curbside pickup (there’s no curb, but you know what we mean). At first I had put a large appliance box out there as is (the directions made no mention of flattening the cardboard), but after the plumber advised me that it should be cut up and flattened (did I mention how great it is to have helpful neighbors?), I went back to it. A dark shape scurried out into the underbrush. Sagan, our cat. I hadn’t even known she was out of the house! And she’d found the one open box within 200 yards that would have gotten her transported god-knows-where and reycled into whatever cats-in-boxes get recycled into. Gah!
Around 12:30 we precipitately locked up the camper and jaunted off to Belfast — spurred in part by Martha’s enthusiasm — saw the town for the first time, ate lunch in a very nice place, walked around a bit, and basically came back home. But we are no longer in the position of saying, “Oh, Belfast? Yes, we mean to get down there some day!” No more “some days” for us.
DOO EEEET!!