Vehicles, abandoning the koi pond, the week ahead

Mama and I went to Bowie to pick up Victoria’s car from the mechanic and were there for over an hour. After I paid the bill and we were driving off the same alarm that has been pestering us showed up and Mama turned around to take the car back to Roger. The car was operating properly but the alarm was illuminated.

He had to set up the computer diagnostic machine to evaluate the car and that took a good bit of time. Once all the alarms were cleared and the codes reset we headed home. All seemed to go well because I had a hard time balancing keeping up with Mama and obeying the speed limits at the same time. Mama now has her transportation back – watch her go.

Since it has been dry for about ten days I got into the hole we are calling the koi pond and dug around a bit to see if I could deepen it so we can move ahead with the project. As I stood in the hole I noticed that the ground was still very soft – sort of gooey. I sank into the clay – which looked crusty from above - and did not like what is was seeing so I began to dig in the soft parts. The smell was pretty awful and it kept getting wetter and wetter. I did not waste too much time or effort after I discovered that the soggy clay would never be able to support a koi pond.

With that project abandoned I need to get the tractor into the back yard to put the mound of dirt originally dug from the hole in the patio back into that hole to refill it. The problem is that the garden shed took away that passage through the fence for the tractor so now I have to make a new one. It should not be a problem but it will require a bit of work.

With that in mind I worked a gate very near the garden shed that has been wired shut since we bought the place- and appears to have been in that state for many years. It will give us a passage to the garden without having to go around the front of the well house. I was also able to get a gate from the garden shed into the garden by rearranging the panels we had there. I will complete that work tonight and hopefully fill the hole on Saturday.

Next week is the busy week. Brittany and Andrew will be coming back from Florida on Monday and leaving for England on Thursday. They will have to make two trips to DFW for that; once to drop off Lucy for her transatlantic flight and once to make their flight. We may have to take the van and follow them for their departure because their car may not be able to accommodate all their luggage. Their car will also be shipped to the UK. I do not know how those arrangements are handled but Brittany has it covered.

On Friday Alfredo and his wife will be coming into DFW. We will pick them up some time before 10 a.m. They are staying the weekend, leaving Monday morning the following week. Tuesday morning Mama and I will get dropped off at DFW for our flight to Juneau; actually, not quite to Juneau. We will have to spend the night in the airport in Seattle and make the 6 a.m. connection to Juneau on Wednesday morning.

But why worry over it. That’s still nine days away.