Clean up, Work Day, RU

Mama, Victoria and Jake went to town this morning to get the food items we are to prep for RU tonight. While there, Mama took Jake to What-a-Burger for the chicken honey biscuit he has been hinting about since he got off the plane. He told Mama that he normally sleeps until 2 pm so he rarely eats breakfast out. So this is a treat for him. I stayed at the house since I had a little work to do and because I did not feel like I would be good company. When I get overloaded, like I am at the moment, I tend to need a bit more space.

I spent the time listening to the Christmas Play that Sam and Erin had loaned me to review. I was almost finished when the breakfast travelers got back home. They were all charged up for me to hook the trailer to the Sequoia so we could tow the mower to Victoria’s house. Grandpa was there working and Victoria and Mama wanted to turn it into a work day. It was one of those moments when you come into a decision has already been made for you and you are expected to know what is going on even though you were not part of the discussion. Plan C was bulldozing right over me and I had never heard Plans A and B. I complied - at least to the point that I actually understood what I was supposed to do to fit into the chosen course of action. But only after I finished listening to the play.

For some reason, Mama and Victoria left in a rush to get to the house so Victoria could  start helping Grandpa and Mama could start cleaning the chicken coop. I could sense Mama’s motivation because we had to kill a pretty large rat in the coop last night. Her scream was loud and quite genuine although I had no idea what had triggered it. She was no less panicked after I stomped the rat and got it out of the coop. So to combat the infestation, the coop had to undergo a thorough cleaning up. Little does she understand that the rats actually like it that better. It makes scraps easier to find.

She was well into the cleaning when Jake and I got there with the mower. I took over the coop cleaning so she could start moving - about a two hour chore even with her Bad Boy mower. Once finished to my liking I started helping haul debris out of the house. Grandpa had borrowed a wheelbarrow earlier this morning and had Victoria filling it as I got inside. There was a good bit more there  than I had expected. To Grandpa’s delight Victoria and I took several large loads out of the house which cleaned up one of the back rooms he has been working in. Next week he will be able to make a lot more progress with the broken bits of brick and discarded wood off of the floor.

While Mama mowed, Victoria and I loaded some old yellow pine 2x6’s onto the trailer to clean up a pile in the little shed Grandpa is outfitting for some animal or another - probably pigs. We hauled those to the farm since there was not room to share the trailer between the mower and the lumber. Victoria used the trip to make a desperate potty run at our house. The old boards will allow me to put a floor in the new dry area of the pig sty. It saves me having to use new exterior grade plywood. And I may need to have it ready tomorrow since Mama and Victoria found a sow with piglets for a very good price. But really, without the truck and stock trailer I do not have any idea how we would get the lot of them to the farm. If it is a serious request, we will find a way but I am not sweating the details at the moment.

We have RU tonight. Jake is excited just because we are doing something. When he is home he is left alone through the day while his parents both work. By his account, when they get home they are too worn out to do anything interesting besides watch TV or a movie. ( I can understand their point of view.) So for him, just to be involved in the routine movement of our lives is pretty entertaining. It helps that he has a great spirit and is willing to go along with everything we are doing; regardless of how mundane we find it.

By the time we get him back to New Jersey he will at least be getting up in time for school.