We managed to sell the mid century dresser last night, so there was a delivery to organise.
I have been adding finishing coats to the coffee table top, I’m up to three with possibly another two to get the smoothness it needs.
Amelia was doing her thing this morning, ripping more toys and following me around everywhere.
She got a bit close to Dhama who was in her place on the sofa. There was a baring of teeth and a snap leaving Amelia with a couple of teeth marks on her cheek. This was not what we wanted to happen. Kelli is in contact with the person from the humane society who is an expert on animal behaviour. Our dogs are setting boundaries that Amelia has to learn.
The delivery of the dresser was interesting, we had to take it to the car park of a community bank in the town. We took several tries to get on to the correct road, because some were closed due to roadworks.
Finally the transfer was done, and we drove back home to bedlam.
The day dawned, everything was quiet in the dogs room.
We didn’t have the best of nights, mainly preempting what might happen in the morning.
We each had our roles, I would be at the door to let them outside whilst Kelli opened the door to the dogs room and open Amelia’s cage.
To our relief they all followed each other out into the back garden.
Kelli went out to see if the new girl would do her piss and poo. My job was to dish out the food.
As soon as the door is opened they all rushed in like their lives depended on it.
From that on, she was much calmer, she tried to play with the others, but they weren’t keen, so there were the occasional growls to indicate their disinterest.
After breakfast it was walkie time, the first time there were three dogs to control, and it took a bit of getting used to.
Several times of the day we put her in the cage whilst we worked, of course there had to be calming doggie music playing to chill her out.
We didn’t want to come back inside and find all our shoes shredded. This also gives our dogs a chance to rest as they are guarded most of the time.
It is like having a child running about, getting under our feet and needing attention.
There were plenty of toys in a basket that had been generally destroyed by Phoebe in the past. She used to tear the squeaker out, then leave the rest. Amelia on the other hand takes this to another level. The fabric part is torn to shreds and the stuffing is all over the floor, the place looks like a crime scene.
I bought her a bone from Menards, once she got her jaws around it she didn’t stop until it had gone.
It certainly a bit different around here, we’re hoping that life settles down a bit so we can get back to normality.
Well we might have done something that would change our lives.
Kelli had found two free pieces of furniture but we had to travel to Allandale to collect them.
At least it was in a different place to the usual area of free stuff, Hudsonville.
It took just over half an hour to get there, the house was large and impressive, within an estate of equally impressive buildings.
The pieces were outside a barn a small distance away from the main house.
The furniture always looks smaller than you imagine, and as we wanted both, it was a puzzle trying to get them both to fit.
We had to bungee the back door, but everything was on board.
The drive back was uneventful, we offloaded the pieces in Kelli’s mum’s garage then headed home for some lunch.
This I stress was not the life changing event.
The next thing on our list was a visit to the Harbour humane society. We missed out on one foster, but we wanted to check out some others. This time we took our two with us, so there were quite a few whines from them as we traveled north towards Grand Haven.
Kelli was excited to meet another potential dog that we had seen the last time.
Amelia, yes that was her name, had a difficult life having a few failed adoptions behind her, and she was favourite.
Of course there were many in the kennels that would melt your heart, including a boxer mix that looked so cute. That was my choice as Boxers are my favourite, but we found out that she didn’t mix well with other dogs, and had even attacked a cow. We couldn’t imagine how something so small could tackle such a large animal.
So we chose Amelia, and introduced her to Dhama and Phoebe. There was a bit of growling mainly from Dhama the alpha, but on the whole the body language was positive, so we decided to foster her.
The society provided the cage, bedding and food and we would keep her until someone came along to adopt her.
The drive back home was particularly quiet, Amelia was in her cage in the back with our two on the rear seats.
Once we got back the fun started.
Amelia was hyper, Dhama almost choked on her own growls and Phoebe was standing her ground.
It was understandable that the new girl was in an unfamiliar environment, and even we were uneasy with the atmosphere. There were two “accidents” but once in her cage she settled down and whilst I was working in the same room she was okay.
The thought was how tomorrow might go, had we made a mistake? That was a question that would be asked at a different time.
After a bit of a restless night for both of us, we tried very hard to put it behind us. Kelli is doing well to control the frustration of not being able to get back to sleep after a toilet break.
We managed five hours, which isn’t good but better than nothing. Getting up early, having a good breakfast I was able to get started in the garage early.
I made great progress on the table top, finishing the last of the squares. It had been quite therapeutic scraping carefully each of them.
Working on that in between helping Kelli stripping the dresser we collected last night.
We’ve noticed that Don, Larry’s old lodger, has turned up again. His van has been parked round the back for the last few days and nights.
I think he spends the night in it, as he runs his engine for hours.
He used to sleep in Larry’s basement, but as he drinks a lot, he had to leave.
Now he will only leave, to refuel and to buy more booze. When he left this morning, his empties were left on the driveway.
We were supposed to drive to Hudsonville to collect a couple of free dressers, but the person got confused and gave them to someone else.
Kelli was not impressed, but she managed to find one close by, but it cost ten bucks.
However, she also managed to sell the four chairs on our weekend sale, meaning we didn’t make as much on them that we should have.
I did more scraping on the table top, and set about trying to repair a drawer from the “side of the road” dresser. Unfortunately the front was twisted, and I’ve run into those issues before.
The drawer never sits correctly in the dresser, so now I have three drawers to make.
We had to Kelli’s mum to move her autumn stuff upstairs and bring down her Christmas stuff.
This included the tree that I set up in front of the window, plugging it in only to discover that only have the lights were working. I expect I will be back to check then one by one to find the faulty one.
Kelli found another dresser for eight buck at a town called Dorr.
We collected the dresser from a mobile home park out in the wilderness, we had intended to drive on the collect the other piece, but the chairs were being collected at a specific time so we had to return home to get them ready.
A lady had driven for an hour to buy these, and she did like them, fortunately. I helped to load them into her truck and off she went.
Now we had to remove the dresser from our vehicle and set off, to collect our next furniture piece, you could say we were going door to Dorr.
It took us forty minutes to get there, longer than we thought, but the piece had potential, so the trip was worthwhile.
Driving down I could see most houses had Christmas decorations up and shining bright.
Most people start straight after thanksgiving, everywhere it looks wonderful, if nothing else it brightens up the gloomy places at least once a year.
We were determined to finish the mid century dresser today. It needed more finish to the top and two drawer fronts. This meant bringing them into the house to dry, but we did it.
We got pictures of it and it was posted on Marketplace.
We now have two dressers purchased by the same person that we have to keep until March.
The only place to store them is the room off the garage that had to be cleared out.
There were all the drawers and doors from the old kitchen that we had been saving, for what reason? Not sure.
With the two dressers safely stored, I had to make two guides for drawers for the mid century piece. I dragged the saw outside, which was getting much colder, and cut up some oak to make them.
For some reason sawdust was going everywhere although I had a bag that is supposed to collect the dust. I think I will have to connect a vacuum to it, otherwise I will continue to get covered in the stuff.
We paid a second visit to the local humane society to take a look at another dog. Freddy, our first choice, was not suitable to hang out with our other dogs, as it was a bit highly strung.
We saw another one whose name was Peter, now if that’s not a potential opportunity for confusion, then nothing is.
We checked him out, and his profile mentioned that he would be good around other animals. We did view a pit bull mix, who was lovely, and also very strong, just a bit too lively for our home.
We learnt later in the evening that Peter had been adopted, that was disappointing, So we will foster a different pooch, but act much quicker.
I had to go to Kelli’s mums to wait for a repair man to arrive to look at her walking machine.
I had tried to look at it a few days ago, but didn’t have the knowledge or the test equipment to see what was wrong.
I was there just in case the machine had to be moved, so while I was waiting I removed the screw holding the plastic covers in place.
Once I removed them I could see all the components that worked the appliance.
I plugged it in, and switched it on. There was a red neon that lit up, proving that the switch and power supply were okay.
I was still confused, and tried to chase the cable from the electronics to the display on the top of the treadmill. I noticed there was a slot at the base of the display and then noticed the safety line hanging over one of the handles. This had a black plastic clip and an orange piece at the other end of a piece of cord. Then the penny dropped, the orange end should fit into the slot, which it did.
At that point the display burst into life, everything was working as it should.
I called out to Georgia, and showed her the working treadmill, explaining the purpose of the safety line.
“I’ve never used that line” she said indignantly.
“ It won’t work without it” I argued.
And so the discussion went on, she wouldn’t accept what I was telling her, and she swore that line was never fitted.
I left triumphant that I solved the problem, and Kelli messaged the guy not to bother to call.
That was that, we did get a call from her later to say that I was correct, and that the cord must have got pulled out by her grandchildren.
Anyway she is now able to do her daily exercise however long that lasts.
There is a lot of talk on the independent media about the World Economic Forum (WEF) and its plans for “the great reset”. This is all about the world post Covid, and how the future of the world would look like. I won’t go into detail on this blog, but urge my reader to do their own research because the implications, should they be accepted by all world leaders could affect everyone.
Since I reeducated myself and done so much reading, both Kelli and myself are far more sceptical of what is newsworthy. With that in mind, we take most things we hear with a very large pinch of salt.
As long as it doesn’t stop me getting on a plane when I want to, I don’t care anymore.
The snow has gone, the slightly warmer weather has done its job, the garage door was open with the sun shining through.
I looked out towards Kelli’s wild garden and noticed that the bird bath had suffered a terrible accident. Half of the ceramic bath had broken off leaving the other half attached to the base column. Normally that should have fallen as well but it was held in balance by a block of ice.
I pointed it out to Kelli who immediately went over to investigate. She was horrified at what had happened, but she made the mistake of touching the ice with the lightest of touch.
It was just enough to disturb the balance and send the remaining part of the bird bath plummeting to earth breaking into many pieces.
She was now doubly horrified, but for me it was the funniest thing I had seen in ages, and I ribbed her all night long.
We finally got to The Butler to have my birthday burger, it was delicious, I can’t wait for the next one in another fifteen years.
We got to the place early, it was so early we gave the chef a lift. That of course is not true, but we did get a parking space outside the main entrance. Inside, it was just how we remembered it, all white and grey, well that was the hair colours of the customers, so I fitted in well, Kelli, on the other hand stuck out like a sore thumb.
We had a table overlooking the water and the sun setting over the trees.
I managed to drink two pints of a wonderful amber ale, so by the end of the meal I was a bit merry, we carried out our doggie boxes with my tomorrows lunch the three feet to where the car was parked.
Saugatuck has its Christmas lights up already, making the high Street look like the main runway at Chicago airport.
Earlier in the day we did our shopping instead of Thursday. Magically it had everything that it had run out last week, no doubt a bout of panic buying.
We did a bit of work in the garage working on the mid century piece. The top that I stained a couple of days ago is taking an age to dry, a real drag.
Today is my grandson’s eighth birthday so I gave him a FaceTime call. He’d had a good day with lots of his friends leaving him tired. It was good to see him again and reminded me of the birthdays with my boys. Maybe they weren’t as extravagant as Ethan’s but in our own way they were as fun.
There was more snow today, but it’s supposed to get a bit warmer over the next few days.
Working in the garage is hard because things take so long to dry. I had veneer work to do to two drawer fronts and a bit of sanding, and that was it, I’d had enough.
We took the dogs for a walk in the park, we are trying to do that every day so we don’t fester away, along with our hand weight training, it not exactly Rocky, but it’s good for us.
With all this cold weather we have the regular weekday starting of the neighbourhood car, and then leave them running for half an hour, which disturbs Kelli’s sleep. She really can hear a flea fart, it’s uncanny.
Another Lifetime to go 