Moving slowly on....and on....and on....
Posted 09-17-2021 at 01:05 PM by rodentraiser
I think I'm finally not living like a pioneer anymore. No, the contractor did not come hook up the septic hose. After 6 - count 'em - 6 promises of he'd show up, he never did. I finally got tired of waiting on him and called a mobile RV repairman to do the RV stuff, mainly because I have a propane leak in the trailer and that needs to be fixed.
But the RV guy showed up day before yesterday and put the hose on, installed the toilet, attached the hose, and checked for leaks. So now I have an INDOOR TOILET and INDOOR RUNNING WATER, along with electricity. WOO HOO HOO!
Unfortunately, I still can't cook in the trailer because the leak is "somewhere" and the RV guy will be coming out in October to more or less tear the trailer apart to find that leak.
The bed arrived and I've been sleeping in the new trailer for a month now. It's been great, except for today when it's rained for the first time since June. I still have leaks in the roof and the contractor sent his guy in to seal those last night, although whether the sealant dried in the 6 hours before it started to rain has yet to be determined.
Besides the roof over the trailer that still isn't installed, the other bad news is that I still don't have hot water, since the water heater appears to have been bypassed. So I guess I'll get one of those on-demand hot water things, but that will have to wait till next year, as they are expensive.
I also still don't have my stuff moved in out of storage yet. People keep bailing on me for helping me move (can't imagine why lol I mean moving is such fun) and I still don't have a shed for the washer and dryer. I also don't have a dryer I can use. Apparently I need to convert the 110 at the power box to 220.
I also don't have a computer connection yet. My only options are satellite connections and the only 2 companies that offer it charge double what Comcast does for service and the cheapest company wants $400 upfront before they'll come out. Then I hear the service is really crappy, too.
So now I'm looking at putting a phone line in and getting DSL. Slow, but better than nothing. My contractor said he should be able to trench a line in and I said well, gee, I really did want computer access before 2030. Sorry, guy, I like you and all, but I need someone more reliable. But I have my computer set up so I can listen to the music in my folders and WATCH DVDS! Finally, I have something to do at night besides stare at the walls.
I did find an absolutely lovely writing desk for a computer desk and it came with an adjustable padded chair for only $75. Since I'm turning the bedroom into the living room, I had to get rid of the base for the bed first. That's done. Now I just have to get the blinds down and clean that room and my computer desk can be moved in.
My computer is currently on the kitchen dinette table and once I move the computer, I can start taking out the dinette set. But the first thing that struck me was, how is anything going through that narrow door between the kitchen and the bathroom (which I'll have to walk through to get to the living room but hey, it's my trailer)?
That door is only 18 inches wide. Not only would the computer desk not go through it, but neither would my 7ft sofa.
Well, the guy that sealed my trailer yesterday had the solution. He cut out a section of the wall so now everything can be lifted through. I say lifted because that wall was behind the toilet. So now you can see the toilet from both the kitchen and the living room. Joy.
Well, after things get moved in, I'll fix that wall at the same time I get some walls up between the kitchen and the bedroom. And I'm thinking I can get a screen up around the toilet. I'm just so happy to have an indoor place to live that doesn't have mold all over it, the details aren't bothering me too much right now.
And on the way home, I'm buying a a small, electric space heater until I can get my big heater moved in.
And this is the sort of thing that sums up how my life is going at the moment. I ordered a birdbath online from Walmart. In amongst all those lovely (and expensive) birdbaths, I saw one I just loved. Ordered it and waited eagerly for it to arrive. It did, last Monday. And you should have seen my face when I opened the package.
The bird bath was 8 inches - kid you not- high. A sparrow couldn't have fit in it. Soooo...back to Walmart went I and hopefully in a couple of weeks, I'll be refunded and then buy another one. But I'll be damn sure to read every line in the description this time!
Meantime, the animals are getting tamer. What I thought was a red squirrel is a Douglas squirrel (there really is a difference), what I thought were chickadees are juncos and what I thought were juncos are towhees. Either way, I have a lot of all of them.
I have mountain quail (NOT California quail - I double checked that one) showing up and someone told me birders will come up to this area just to knock them off their list. Supposedly they're rare, shy, and unseen. Mine come out for seed twice a day, a couple of adults and 7 chicks.
I also have 5 Western jays (the blue ones with black caps) showing up now and they're eating me out of house and home. The doves have multiplied to about 30 now, the towhees have learned to wait for me to throw peanuts to them, and Reddy the squirrel sits on my lap.
In fact, when I go in at night, I have to take my box of kleenex with me because Reddy will show up early the next morning and yank out tissue after tissue and stuff them all in his hidey-holes. He'd go through a box a week if I let him. And guess what I found in the house? A mouse! Yeah, I know, but this wasn't just any mouse.
I was up at 3am one night and this little thing was going around and around my bedroom. I thought it was a big beetle and almost smushed it, but then I noticed the little bitty tail. It was a baby mouse so young the ears hadn't even pulled away from his head yet. He was about the size of my thumbnail.
So I caught him and put him in the plastic mouse trap I had and gave him some sunflower seeds and some kleenex. He was sound asleep in the morning, so I took the whole trap outside and left it open so he could go in and out. Then I felt terrible, thinking I should have kept him at least until he was grown a little more.
But I put out sunflower seeds every night and they kept getting eaten. A week later I finally closed the trap to see if I was feeding an adult mouse or the baby and it was...the baby. He was almost double his size, his ears were open on his head, and he looked like he was still doing fine. And I'm still going out at night and feeding him.
Yeah, that's me. Save $20 a month by not going to the laundromat and spend $25 a month feeding critters that don't need feeding. But that's how I've been starting my mornings most days, is throwing out seed and sunflower seeds and peanuts, and watching the birds, the chipmunks, Reddy, and the rabbits all come out and begin their day. I bet my blood pressure has dropped 20 points.
Anyway, I'll update everyone next month after the mobile RV guy has found the leak. Maybe by then I'll have my stuff out of storage. At that point, maybe I'll find my camera and take some pictures to post. I guess it goes without saying though, that from now till next June it will rain. *sigh*
But the RV guy showed up day before yesterday and put the hose on, installed the toilet, attached the hose, and checked for leaks. So now I have an INDOOR TOILET and INDOOR RUNNING WATER, along with electricity. WOO HOO HOO!
Unfortunately, I still can't cook in the trailer because the leak is "somewhere" and the RV guy will be coming out in October to more or less tear the trailer apart to find that leak.
The bed arrived and I've been sleeping in the new trailer for a month now. It's been great, except for today when it's rained for the first time since June. I still have leaks in the roof and the contractor sent his guy in to seal those last night, although whether the sealant dried in the 6 hours before it started to rain has yet to be determined.
Besides the roof over the trailer that still isn't installed, the other bad news is that I still don't have hot water, since the water heater appears to have been bypassed. So I guess I'll get one of those on-demand hot water things, but that will have to wait till next year, as they are expensive.
I also still don't have my stuff moved in out of storage yet. People keep bailing on me for helping me move (can't imagine why lol I mean moving is such fun) and I still don't have a shed for the washer and dryer. I also don't have a dryer I can use. Apparently I need to convert the 110 at the power box to 220.
I also don't have a computer connection yet. My only options are satellite connections and the only 2 companies that offer it charge double what Comcast does for service and the cheapest company wants $400 upfront before they'll come out. Then I hear the service is really crappy, too.
So now I'm looking at putting a phone line in and getting DSL. Slow, but better than nothing. My contractor said he should be able to trench a line in and I said well, gee, I really did want computer access before 2030. Sorry, guy, I like you and all, but I need someone more reliable. But I have my computer set up so I can listen to the music in my folders and WATCH DVDS! Finally, I have something to do at night besides stare at the walls.
I did find an absolutely lovely writing desk for a computer desk and it came with an adjustable padded chair for only $75. Since I'm turning the bedroom into the living room, I had to get rid of the base for the bed first. That's done. Now I just have to get the blinds down and clean that room and my computer desk can be moved in.
My computer is currently on the kitchen dinette table and once I move the computer, I can start taking out the dinette set. But the first thing that struck me was, how is anything going through that narrow door between the kitchen and the bathroom (which I'll have to walk through to get to the living room but hey, it's my trailer)?
That door is only 18 inches wide. Not only would the computer desk not go through it, but neither would my 7ft sofa.
Well, the guy that sealed my trailer yesterday had the solution. He cut out a section of the wall so now everything can be lifted through. I say lifted because that wall was behind the toilet. So now you can see the toilet from both the kitchen and the living room. Joy.
Well, after things get moved in, I'll fix that wall at the same time I get some walls up between the kitchen and the bedroom. And I'm thinking I can get a screen up around the toilet. I'm just so happy to have an indoor place to live that doesn't have mold all over it, the details aren't bothering me too much right now.
And on the way home, I'm buying a a small, electric space heater until I can get my big heater moved in.
And this is the sort of thing that sums up how my life is going at the moment. I ordered a birdbath online from Walmart. In amongst all those lovely (and expensive) birdbaths, I saw one I just loved. Ordered it and waited eagerly for it to arrive. It did, last Monday. And you should have seen my face when I opened the package.
The bird bath was 8 inches - kid you not- high. A sparrow couldn't have fit in it. Soooo...back to Walmart went I and hopefully in a couple of weeks, I'll be refunded and then buy another one. But I'll be damn sure to read every line in the description this time!
Meantime, the animals are getting tamer. What I thought was a red squirrel is a Douglas squirrel (there really is a difference), what I thought were chickadees are juncos and what I thought were juncos are towhees. Either way, I have a lot of all of them.
I have mountain quail (NOT California quail - I double checked that one) showing up and someone told me birders will come up to this area just to knock them off their list. Supposedly they're rare, shy, and unseen. Mine come out for seed twice a day, a couple of adults and 7 chicks.
I also have 5 Western jays (the blue ones with black caps) showing up now and they're eating me out of house and home. The doves have multiplied to about 30 now, the towhees have learned to wait for me to throw peanuts to them, and Reddy the squirrel sits on my lap.
In fact, when I go in at night, I have to take my box of kleenex with me because Reddy will show up early the next morning and yank out tissue after tissue and stuff them all in his hidey-holes. He'd go through a box a week if I let him. And guess what I found in the house? A mouse! Yeah, I know, but this wasn't just any mouse.
I was up at 3am one night and this little thing was going around and around my bedroom. I thought it was a big beetle and almost smushed it, but then I noticed the little bitty tail. It was a baby mouse so young the ears hadn't even pulled away from his head yet. He was about the size of my thumbnail.
So I caught him and put him in the plastic mouse trap I had and gave him some sunflower seeds and some kleenex. He was sound asleep in the morning, so I took the whole trap outside and left it open so he could go in and out. Then I felt terrible, thinking I should have kept him at least until he was grown a little more.
But I put out sunflower seeds every night and they kept getting eaten. A week later I finally closed the trap to see if I was feeding an adult mouse or the baby and it was...the baby. He was almost double his size, his ears were open on his head, and he looked like he was still doing fine. And I'm still going out at night and feeding him.
Yeah, that's me. Save $20 a month by not going to the laundromat and spend $25 a month feeding critters that don't need feeding. But that's how I've been starting my mornings most days, is throwing out seed and sunflower seeds and peanuts, and watching the birds, the chipmunks, Reddy, and the rabbits all come out and begin their day. I bet my blood pressure has dropped 20 points.
Anyway, I'll update everyone next month after the mobile RV guy has found the leak. Maybe by then I'll have my stuff out of storage. At that point, maybe I'll find my camera and take some pictures to post. I guess it goes without saying though, that from now till next June it will rain. *sigh*
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