Impact of rain, Mama and Victoria

Part of the direct impact we've had from the rain here lately, was that the tree Mama and I have worried about just South of the duck enclosure, uprooted and fell onto the enclosure a couple of nights ago. The damage wasn't that extensive, but the repair will be time-consuming. The structure of the enclosure held together pretty well and the large box that I had in there for the ducks to lay in actually held the weight of the tree as it collapsed and tore through part of the roof. I took some time last night after I got off work to look at the damage First I cut away the tree from the duck pen to see if I could at least lift the roof back up and secure it as close to the way it should have been setting before the tree fell on it so that as we get a couple of inches of rain over the next couple of days it would at least keep the duck pen somewhat protected. That turned out to be harder than I thought it would.

I had to use the tractor to move the tree after I had gotten everything cut away from the roof and sides of the enclosure. With the ground as soft as it was and the tree is heavy aa it was, that proved a bit of a challenge. My 20-inch chainsaw would not function properly so, I had to use my smaller chainsaw and it turned out the blade for that chainsaw was completely worn out. So, I set aside the 20-inch chainsaw, sharpened the blade on the smaller chainsaw, and just did the best I could. Fortunately, when I got to the point where I needed two people to try and slide a piece of metal underneath the tear in the roof where a limb had pierced through the roofing, Norman was just coming out to check and see how I was doing. With his help we got a piece of metal in place and as it rained today not very much of that rain actually got into the duck pen, but if we do get an inch of rain tomorrow, I don't think I'll be able to boast in that claim.

Hopefully, I will be able soon to tear off the roof, rebuild the structure, and then replace the roof and maybe even do a little bit better job on the structure than I originally did. In the meantime, our ducks are just gonna have to make do with the pen that's a little bit damper than what they're used to. Needless to say, based on the trauma they suffered when the tree crashed down on them, they are not laying right now. I guess that's to be expected.

Yesterday morning Mama and Victoria caught a plane to Florida. As Mama was rearranging and swapping purses Wednesday afternoon, she realized that she did not have her driver's license in her wallet as she would have expected. We searched everywhere. We opened every purse she ever carried. We looked through the pocket of every shirt and jacket she had ever worn. And we looked in places where there was even the remotest possibility that she could have set the license down. To no avail. So, I gave Mama her expired driver’s license to take with her along with her passport. That would provide sufficient identification for her to board the plane, but it would not allow her to rent and drive a vehicle.

When we were coming home from church Wednesday night, Mama asked me to fish out a jacket that she had stored in the car. Over the process of several days, we had folded the seats down on top of that jacket. I fished that jacket out for Mama to put with her stuff that she would carry to the airport, and hauled Victoria and Mama to the airport early Thursday morning. I got home about 8:10 from that drop off. It was only about 30 minutes later that Mama called me. She found her license. For some odd reason she had stuck her license in the upper pocket of that Jean jacket that she had not worn for quite some time period she only discovered her license there when she put on the jacket at the airport and then went fishing through the pockets of the jacket. Well, praise the Lord!

However, when Mama and Victoria did arrive at the airport in Pensacola, the reservation that I had thought I had made for them for some reason was not registering on the computer have the car rental company. Mama and Victoria hopped from car rental counter to car rental counter trying to find available cars at a price that they thought was reasonable -something less than $100 a day. It took some searching, but they did finally find a car rental agency that did not have an office in the Pensacola airport, but rather was stationed outside the terminal in the little booth. They were able to rent a car for about $60 a day plus all of the other things that they charge you in conjunction with the car rental. All told, they are ending up with a final charge of about $499 for the five days Mama and Victoria will be in Pensacola. Ouch!

The reason Mama and Victoria are in Pensacola is because Victoria has been looking at houses for purchase and or for rent in the Pensacola area. She and Corie are anticipating Mykenzie being a student at Pensacola Christian college within the next 18 months to two years. Victoria is thinking that if she can relocate to Florida - a move that would not necessarily be a hardship for her - then she and Mykenzie could share the house while Mykenzie attended college there. I think they're finding that to be a little bit of a pipe dream. Recently interest mortgage rates have jumped to almost 8%. Navy Federal Credit Union, as Victoria pre-applied for a loan, gave her an interest of 9.3%. Double Ouch!

On $150,000 loan that adds about $850 to $900 per month to the mortgage payment just in interest. Realistically, that is probably not doable, but she and Mama are still looking at houses currently available on the market in both Pensacola and Milton. The fact that they get to go to the beach several evenings during their five days in Pensacola were a tremendous attraction for Mama to make the trip with Victoria. Also, Mama just needs a break, and why not make that break a beach break. On the good side, from my way of thinking, since they flew to Pensacola, there's very little that Mama is going to be able to buy and bring back from Pensacola to the farm. So, I may not end up with a lot of extra stuff to try and find places for.

Right now, the garage, the shop, the well house, the barn, and any place where we have items being stored are overflowing with clutter. Even certain places in the house where Mama has tried to consolidate her crafts are just overloaded with totes and boxes. Tables are piled up with sundry items that may one day actually turn into some type of marketable craft. In my shop, Norman has supplied us with hundreds of board feet of lumber from the projects that he has been working on that may also end up turned into crafts at some future date. But right now, they are just occupying space in my shop making it difficult for me to work on anything that actually needs to be done.

I hate clutter, so, I am not sure that is a good problem.