Sheep Guarding Llama

My second day of training at the office. Spent the whole day in class again, had a good time and learned quite a bit, I think. A good use of my time.

Like yesterday I worked for several hours after being done with class and heading back home.

Today the family is at Howe Caverns near Herkimer, New York. I have not been there since I was really little and this is the first time for Liesl and Luciana. They had fun today but it wasn’t their favourite field trip ever.

What everyone that was big enough to do so (so not Luciana) loved today was the zip lining that they did at Howe Caverns. They had so much fun that Dominica is now convinced that we should go to Costa Rica and take a zip lining vacation.

And my lonely week begins.  Last week was only a partial week alone but this week is a full week.  On my drive into the office this morning I began rereading Isaac Asimov’s “Foundation.”  I last read “Foundation” somewhere in the vicinity of the seventh grade.  I can remember reading it and the other two books in the trilogy while at Pavilion Baptist School and I associate it with the classroom that they used for us in seventh grade so I am guessing that that is when I read it but it is really hard to say for sure, it might have been earlier.  “Foundation” has been one of my all time favourite books since I originally read it.  Such a great classic.

After work I just came home and did nothing. I am pretty much avoiding the house in general and just camping out in the bedroom.  At least I am getting some “me” time, but more than I would like, that’s for sure.  Quite a bit depressed being alone this much.

I slept in until nine thirty.  I was awake for a while before that but was not going to abandon my last Liesl snuggles for the week any earlier than I had to.  Once I was up it was pretty much just getting dressed, grabbing some donuts and loading up the Spark for the trip back down south.

Before leaving I helped Dominica’s dad move two of the larger pieces of furniture out to the curb for the weekly pickup from the “new” house.  I think that that is the extent of what is planned to be done over there today.  Everyone is really exhausted from yesterday and today everyone is heading to the lake to go swimming and relax.

I got on the road myself just before they were all leaving to go to the lake.  We had thought about having me go to the lake but it would have just added forty to sixty minutes to my drive, cost eight dollars in entrance fees and I would have gotten only a tiny bit of time there while the kids were off playing with each other anyway. Not a good use of time.  So I went straight home.

I stopped and filled up the car with high octane Citgo petrol to see if that would help with the stalling problem that I had on the trip north.  Then it was straight out of town and on my way.

The drive went very smoothly.  Nothing to mention.  It was eighty two today and traffic was not bad.  I managed to nearly finish “An Acceptable Time” during the drive.

I got home around two.  Did really nothing this evening, took the time to just relax.  This is going to be a long, lonely week for me.  But at least it is only a four day work week, I get to head up to Waverly on Friday morning so not as bad as it could be.  I’m still not looking forward to another week alone in the house, though.

I am starting to hear what I think are rats in the ceiling above our bedroom too.  Just great.

Today is the day for me to help everyone work on the new house next door to Dominica’s parents’ house.  Before we got started Madeline and Emily made a trip for donuts and half moons from the Friendly Bake Shop but did not get nearly enough so Emily and I made a trip there as well and to Stewart’s for cookies.  We got a huge load of donuts for everyone preparing to work on the house.

This morning was my first time getting a first hand look at the house and the dumpster that was already a third full of junk and garbage taken out of the house.  We did a crazy amount of work today which was amazing considering how much work has already been done this week.  There is just so much to do and the house is so disgusting that it is really hard to be productive.

Almost first thing this morning Dominica managed to puncture her hand with something nasty in the house and had to go to an urgent care facility to get a tetanus shot because she has not had one in a long time.  So we lost her for a few hours.  She was probably thankful for the puncture and shot rather than being in the house all of that time.  On top of being disgusting it is pretty hot today making it all that much worse.  We are all drenched in sweat.

The house was truly disgusting, I can only imagine what it was like before they spent the better part of the week working on it before I got here.  There is so much trash out in the dumpster already!  We moved a ton of furniture today, which was pretty risky as there are needles and razor blades hidden all over the place.  I actually never saw a needle but heard about them finding tons of them but I did see and find razors galore including in the ceiling and all through the furniture.

My part to play is primarily in moving the big, heavy stuff down from the upstairs.  Furniture mostly.  We made big progress today but they have decided that they need to keep the dumpster a little longer and do this all this coming week and I will be coming back up next weekend to continue with the heavy lifting parts to get the rest of the furniture out and to help lift the big stuff up out of the basement.

By this evening we were seriously exhausted.  The heat really made it a lot harder than it should have been.  Had it been a cool day and there not have been risks from blades and needles it would have been pretty easy.

Madeline got to watch all of the kids all day.  Liesl and Luciana are having a lot of fun playing with their cousins.

So the new plan is that Dominica and the girls are going to stay up here for a few weeks now rather than just for the original three days that had been planned when they left Peekskill earlier this week.  The original plan was that they would have been home this morning.  Now we don’t know when they will be home but at least not for another week yet.