Halloween costumes, visiting with Dad

Today, management allowed those who would like to to dress up in Halloween costumes. Some were pretty inventive, some were very comical and some were coordinated to be a cast of characters from Star Wars. One entire department put on a display of about ten characters from the series including Princess Leah, Luke Skywalker, Darth Mal, Yoda, Obi-Wan, Darth Vader and some sand people. It was pretty impressive. One of our younger female sales persons dressed up as a bumble bee in black leggings with a little tutu of frills in yellow and black; not one of the costumes i could really study. In fact, I had to look the other way quite often. There were witches and withered old men. A penguin and a trapper with his son - also in costume. One of the ladies I work with dressed as the Firefox log - complete with twitching ears and wagging tail. She had to turn off the ears in our first meeting because they were sound activated and it was making the presenter nervous. She was going to wear them to a ball game that her son was to play in tonight. I suggested she have an extra set of batteries on hand since the noise would never stop.

Over the weekend I drove down to help Martha and whomever else showed up to clear out the big house and some of the outbuildings. Don on Friday night, back on Saturday afternoon. With our roundabout way of skirting Ft Worth I did not get into too much traffic, which was good since I left Decatur at 5 pm. Saturday morning Martha and I started at 7:30 and were joined by Cathie, Chuck and one of their teen sons about 10 a.m. I worked until about 1 pm and I called it a day at the house so I would have time to go see Dad and still make it home before dark. That was stretching it but I did make it.

My visit with dad was a very good one. I could have spent a couple hours because he was in good spirits and very chatty. I found him in the common area so I pulled up a chair and sat down where he was. He is having difficulty getting up and down so it was good to see him out of his room. As soon as he saw me his face lit up. It was very encouraging to be welcomed in that way since last time we visited he seemed to be really struggling to get any words out. He asked me my age and reflected that most of his issues stem more from advancing years that any other ailment. He talked about Mom’s quick fading away and his lingering as he waits on the Lord to take him home.

We spent the majority of our time talking about the Lord. That is the one area where he really can connect. He seemed to really enjoy the conversation and the interaction and I wish I could have stayed longer but I got ready to leave after about an hour. He started to get up but I waved him back and we prayed right where he was. It caused a bit of a stir in the people around us but Dad enjoys prayer more than he enjoys any other conversation. He has a sense of ‘knowing” when it comes to prayer. In that type of conversation he becomes a true, engaged participant. He probably could not word a prayer by himself but he certainly can enjoy listening in on one. To some it seems like a little thing, but not to Dad. 

I wish I could get there more often but my new full-tine job leaves me with full days and short evenings. It would be lying to say I am enjoying the job more each day but I can honestly say I am learning to do it better day by day.

The pleasure will come later.

Making the most of the day, confirmations at work, traveling

When I got in this morning both of the ladies I work with had had rough evenings and nights. What I found out later is that the morning was rough for each of them because of the drinking they had done the night before. Can’ t feel too sorry for them but it did make for an interesting morning as both of them traded faces about the interruptions, the calls, the background noise, the headaches, etc. I introduced the two of them to the concept of making the most of the day. So when one asked for a hot sauce for a burrito she had bought for breakfast, the other pulled out a large bag of Taco Bell sauces. I asked her if she had robbed a Taco Bell.If we should be looking out for the authorities. That just started the two of them going. But it improved their morning.

Early in the day I had another meeting with my boss and her boss, the man who hired me. In that meeting we discussed how I could take over some if not all of the training the sales staff was now doing. This would free them up to do more in the sales line of the business. I am more than okay with that idea. I am just not sure what all it will eventually entail but I have confidence that I would be watched over to ensure I did not get overwhelmed by taking too much on. It would involve travel but again, I am not sure to what extent. What I do know is that it would not start until January. That gives me time to put the pieces together. 

At church last night Sam Echeveria and I went over the portion of a play the choir will be doing for Christmas this year. Even though the time is short - less than eight weeks - he feels it is doable. I have to concur as long as we have the musicians, actors and choir members to support the effort. Lately we have gotten a few new participants in the choir but I am still praying for more. It is a good ministry. An easy an fun way to really impact the services on Sunday. I enjoy leading the choir but I feel I have so little talent for it that it is sometimes a little intimidating. But we keep going; until the Lord brings someone along who has the skills to do the leading more capably than I do. When and if that happens, I will still enjoy being in the choir.

I will be traveling to Chappell Hill this weekend to meet again with my siblings as we finalize distribution of the remaining items in the big house. It will be another sad time but needful none the less. I hope to limit the amount of things I have to bring back to the farm but I will do what I have to do to help Martha get job done. This will not be the last trip but it should be the last one where I take the trailer to haul things back. 

I plan on seeing Dad sometime Saturday. I will not know how to work that out until I get there but I am looking forward to the visit.

Our “not girls”, more carving photos, babysitting

 With Mama and I both working full time jobs the servicing of daily chores on the farm has had to be reworked. Since I have to be dressed in slacks and a nicer shirt in the morning and since it is dark when we get out of bed until about the time I have to ready to go, the burden of the morning feeding has fallen to Mama for the most part. She does not have to be at work until 8:30 which gives her more time - by a little bit anyway. I generally hear about how the morning went when I meet up with her for lunch or sometimes later in the evening when I finally get home. Today was one of those later revelations. 

We were getting ready for church when she began telling me about the Bantams. We leave the door to their coop open so they can roam because they have a small area and the flock is getting pretty large - in number. It was no surprise to hear they have discovered the goat building and the fact that there is usually feed left in the dish we feed the billy’s out of. She was telling me that she was concerned about the hens getting that food since our chickens are on a particular diet to ensure they lay eggs made with organic feed vs the processed feed normally sold. It was the “not girls” that she was not worried about. “The not girls?” I asked. She realized what she had said and told me she could not think of the word rooster. So now, on our farm, we have girls and not-girls.

Victoria watched the Echeveria from last night through church time today. That is always an interesting time when we have them overnight. The burden of those babysitting times has fallen exclusively to her - again, since Mama and I are both working. It was especially difficult for her this time because she is hurting. When she and Gracie were playing the other day, Gracie suddenly shifted her weight to Victoria as Victoria was crouched down and it pulled out her back pretty badly. That was on Sunday. It is now Wednesday and the pain has only gotten worse and is radiating through her legs into her feet. It is time to get help but with her work schedule she has not had the time yet. Her one day off was spent in keeping the kids - a full time job for anyone. Pray for her to get better. She is too young to have a hurting back.

I have included a few more photos of our pumpkin carving - taken as we were actually carving the gourds.

Day 2

I did a lot better today especially since I knew where I was supposed to fit it. We spent most of the morning carving pumpkins. I was on the team with the CFO and one of the salesmen. It was a lot of fun and as you can see from the pictures there was a lot of creativity exposed in the numerous teams. Bear in mind that we had only an hour to carve them so there was a lot of time and preparation that went into putting the idea into a carved work. My team had me bring barbed wire and fencing staples to adorn our Frankenpunkin. What we did not do is get the right kind of paint to fully cover the pumpkin. We did not do as well as some of the others but we got an honorable mention for the stitching and staples.

The remainder of the day was spent in learning the program I will be mastering to do my job. I am becoming more and more familiar with the program. I was even able to do a bit of fill-in work for one of my peers; assigning certain permissions to over one hundred people. Not necessarily heavy lifting, but it was a help. By the end of the week I should be able to move about in the program pretty well and by the middle of next week I am hoping to be fully ready to answer the phone and become part of the team.

On my out today I was stopped by the CFO and asked about how things are going. When I told him things were all okay and that I would be ready for work pretty soon, he expressed his interest in y background and experience with my previous work. I am hoping to be used in a variety of posts as I am allowed to really help.

Mama is at the ladies Tate Supper at church. She was asked to be one of the tater characters this year and was assigned of all things to be “Miss Hesitater”. She even had to write a little speech. That was the part she got in character on. She had it ready just before the dinner. Unfortunately I will not get to see her perform but I would love to be a fly on the wall.

I sure hope to sleep better tonight than I did last night.

New job, testing

I arrived to my new job a few minutes before my new boss. We sat through orientation together and later sat through several other training sessions together. She is young, energetic and raring to lead. It should be interesting to work for her. But all through the morning I got the feeling that something was off. I had been interviewed for the supervisory position and thought that is what I had been hired for, but when I saw where I was seated and where she was seated I got the distinct impression that that was not the case. So I learned and listened through the day until I had access to a program that revealed my position title - and it was not supervisor. Interesting, I thought, but said nothing. In a meeting that afternoon she introduced herself as the Supervisor of Client Relations. Good thing I had not said anything. But it made me think to when I had originally accepted the offer from Energy World Net and questioned the salary - thinking I was being hired into a supervisory position. I should have cleared that question up then. Hindsight. At least tomorrow I will know where I fit into the hierarchy.

Everyone at the company seemed very nice, very happy to be working EWN. I am expecting no less but am having trouble shaking off a sense of disappointment. On the good side, my immediate coworkers are very supportive of me in the learning curve they  also have all been through. One has only been there since February, another for a little over a year and the third has a whole two years in her current role. ll are equally proficient at what they do so I have hope to get there quickly. As it was with most all of the people I spoke to, many have been in their current role for less than a year; an interesting fact. I am not sure if that is the result of recent growth or of recent turnover. I will listen and find out later.

Tomorrow morning will be spent in a pumpkin carving contest. I am told it is the second annual event. We are to be placed in teams of two or three for the competition and everyone is being very secretive about their plans for the jack-o-lantern we are tasked to make. I will have to gather some items from the farm this evening before we go to FBI to be used in the staging of our proposed Frankenstein head. My teammates are getting other items to complete the carving. It should be fun - as long as the competition stays in the friendly vein. 

Mama, Victoria and I are not looking forward to the first test we have in FBI. It will cover our study of the book of Acts. From the study guide it looks like it will be a difficult one; lots of memorization of sequences, lots of memorization of verses and lots of identification of places and people. None of us have begun to study yet but I took the time while I had it to type out the study guide so I could fill in the responses required when the time did come to study. 

We have two weeks from tonight.

Chemicals, the viewing, Norman news

I spent the morning applying chemicals to our fencerows. The hope is to lessen the growth and thereby lessen the weed eating needed. I will not know for several days if I applied everything heavily enough to make it work but I have high hopes. Now Mama needs me to apply some weed inhibitor to the yard to combat the infestation of a ground cover type of burrs. These are not as bad as the sand burrs but they are certainly prolific. Everyone in the area is fighting them and they seem to be winning. After all, their life depends on it. Sometimes I am reticent to use so many chemicals - even fertilizer - but I do not have the time to dig up the spreading weeds and burn them. That is the only other recourse against their spread that is remotely successful.

Mama got home n a panic this evening. Our neighbors bull and a cow were out on our road. That in itself is not a dangerous situation but keeping them from getting onto the main road that connects to ours is pretty important. They were headed that direction rather than down the road to us. I hurried over to the barn and got a bucket of feed to try to lure them back and just as I was getting far enough down the road to see them the dump truck that makes several trips a day to the quarry just beyond us ambled past me. Wesley, the driver, saw the pair headed for the road and quietly drove past them, got out and started getting them turned around. When the pair saw me they dove back through the fence where they had made their exit. Mama and Ethan Burns, Zach and Alissa’s son who had come home with Mama, drove up the road to check on me as I stood guard at the broken fence. Just when they reached me the owners drove up. Mama had called them to alert them about the wanderers. They are alway thankful about her watch care. This is the same property where our cattle are currently running. Everyone is back where they should be for the night.

Right after we got that done and were finished tending to the evening feeding routine we got in touch with Zack and Alissa and found out they were headed to Victoria’s house. We took Ethan and met them there. Zack took a long time looking inside the house while Alissa, Mama and the kids looked around the outside. Zack does not have the skills to do the work required on the house so his biggest fear is finding the people necessary to teach him how to do it or to do it for him. Those skills, like any other, are learned; but there is always a price to learn, whether it is time or money or both. The bottom line is that this house may be too much for him. When the looming question is, “What do you do with all this ground besides mow it?” there is no interest in developing a farm life. If the acreage is not an attraction, the house is not enough to draw a buyer to the property.

Norman went to see the doctor yesterday but we have not heard if there were any results announced. He is having the same bowel bleeding issues that Grandpa is having. From what I understand he will be going back to the doctor in November for further testing. As for the property negotiations with the owners of the property in Bowie, that is on hold until December. 

No news is good news for now.

Disappointment, possibility for Victoria, Norman

I spent the day at the church hoping to use the internet there to help me upload a spreadsheet from Victoria’s computer to one of my online programs but she did not have the necessary software on her computer to allow me to do what I needed. I have been hindered loading a spreadsheet created in Mac proprietary software into the database I need to get it into. I can load a very simplified version but it does not allow me to add columns used as identifiers. I will try from home on the older Mac I have there to see if it will do what I need. Otherwise, I will work with the limited version for now. In some ways I am on hold with my little business until I can stabilize my own income but I am actually getting some money from the business. So this little setback is not debilitating.

Since that was what I had taken the day to accomplish it was a little disappointing to fail. But I did get to use the faster service to research a couple items I have been putting off. When my Mom passed away she had donated her body to science. In doing so she spared us the expense of a normal burial and all the related costs. Mama and I are intrigued by the idea. Why add the expense and cumbersome coordination of a traditional burial - casket, burial plot, etc - to leaving this world? So I took the time to research organizations that do that for people. It was interesting to see just how many organizations provide that service. It will still take some time to do the reviews and make the calls to whichever one we choose but it will complete our estate planning; something Mama and I are committed to do. It is one of those unpleasant tasks that if not completed makes things difficult for those who have to pick up the pieces of final arrangements left unfinished.

Also, since I was at the church to have lunch with Mama I got to talk at length with Zach Burns - our assistant pastor and principal at the school. He is interested in Victoria’s house. It will be an uphill battle to convince his wife it is a good idea, but he and I got to crunch some numbers so he could see both the overall costs as well as the ongoing monthly costs while in the process of completing the remodel. I got the sense that it was all pretty overwhelming but he is still very interested in at least considering the purchase. He and his family will be looking at the house tomorrow. That will be the telltale moment for his wife. Many buyers - men and women included - lack the vision to see the finished product when the actual physical condition is presently no where close. I have been fortunate in having a wonderful wife with such vision; not to mention trust in me.

Tomorrow Norman et.al. will sit down with the owner of the property in Bowie. Grandma and Grandpa have been renting the trailer house for most of the year. (It is the same property they rented before we bought the farm in Bowie.) Now, Norman has approached the owner who is in poor health for the opportunity to lease with the option to buy. 

The outcome of this meeting will determine how easy or how difficult their relocation to Texas will be. They need your prayers.