Here are some updates:
Grapes of Wrath - those somewhat squatters told me they were getting paid on the Monday and would be able to move into a motel room. But their boss found out about them staying here and he told me payday wasn't going to be until Thursday, but he would figure something out, maybe give them an advance. I had to go away for the week, and when I got back they were working on the jobsite - I think her role was make-work. But most important, they moved out of my guest cabin.



The highway closure started this past Monday and two days later I was tired of it. It forces me to get out of the house by 8 am every day, seven days a week, and then I can't come back until the 4 pm to 7 pm window. So I have to leave home early and stay in town all day. I can go around the long way, adds 45 minutes to my one way commute. The time and gas consumption is a factor, but the other thing is I simply don't like that particular route, and it's hard to explain why, because it is a winding, scenic mountain road just like the one I usually use.

The other night I had a coalition board meeting and this one old guy (that means older than me) is one of those people who can't edit their remarks to be relevant and succinct. In order to tell the group that he found a hydrologist to talk about river health, he described a man who moved to Georgia, a meeting/social event where he met this second guy, how this second guy is on maternity leave because his wife had twins, the fact that this old guy has twins of his own, and some more diversions. All this to say: I found a speaker for the January meeting.

Anyhow, due to this sort of thing, the meeting ended at 6:45 and I had to be at the road closure barrier by 7 pm to get through. I drove at dangerous speeds to get there, pulled up at 7:07, and it was too late. They told me to turn around and go the long way, which was going to be that much longer since there would be back-tracking, but then they relented and let me through. I promised myself I'd never cut it that close again, but we're talking 8 months of this, so it's bound to happen again, especially when the roads are bad and we can't hurry and stay safe. Two weeks ago I got up at 4 am and made breakfast burritos for the highway flaggers because their crew change is at 6 am. I will do it again some time, but it's a lot of work, and would be different if I had help, but that's too early to expect other people to come to my house. I will get better at it, though, and it will go faster. Meanwhile, this weekend I'm baking cookies for them.

My ace in the hole is that if it all becomes too much I can go to Las Vegas for while. And I will definitely be going for the holidays, at least 6 weeks. One problem there is we don't have good TV reception there because we don't want to pay double for satellite TV.

Our weather has been unseasonably hot, but we finally got some crisp weather before the next heat wave moves in.