Saturday, November 9, 2013

Catching up (again, and again.....)

Someone mentioned yesterday that it had been a while since I have updated my blog. Well, yes, it has. I can't seem to keep up with anything anymore. Last Thursday, I decided I was going to break down and hire someone to clean my house. Then I thought, Robert is moving out in a couple more months, and then surely Andrew and I won't be as messy. Then I thought, all Robert does here now is sleep and occasionally eat, it's not him....THEN, I thought, it is because Andrew and Robert are neither one here much at all. This probably doesn't make sense except for the fact that in our "normal" (yes, whatever that is supposed to be) lives, a lot of times after dinner, Andrew and I would visit while we put the dishes in the dishwasher, put dinner away, did a load of laundry, cleaned the puppy area, etc. It didn't seem like we were doing anything because we were together and now, doing it all by myself just feels like an endless amount of work. So, moral of the story, once we get the farm done, I think we can cope again. I'm looking forward to it.

Things never seem to slow down at work either. I never dreamed there would come a day when someone else was doing more of the "day-in, day-out" work with LIHEAP more than I was, but it has come. I am so very, very, thankful for Sheila King, the assistant LIHEAP coordinator. I don't want to say she is "my" assistant because heck, I think we are to the point where, as far as LIHEAP is concerned, I am helping her. It seems there seems to be so many other issues, between the PIPP part of our program, money issues, IT issues, etc. that if it weren't for Sheila, I would never be home either. And mentioning the IT issues....

Two weeks ago, we had a bad, bad, virus in the office. It attacked one computer and then went on to get the file server that all 25 of us share. It has been a long two weeks, as problems from that arose again the beginning of this week. This virus attacked actual files, documents that we HAVE to have and were no longer being able to open. Thankfully, we have a good support team in SDS computers and after many hours on Monday evening and Tuesday, we were back up. In the meantime, we have decided to start hosting our own email again. Something which, with me being responsible for it, I am scared to death, but also know after the recent attack, is necessary.

Then to top off everything at work, we have our first monitoring of the year on the 19th and 20th. I am scared to death......seriously, I KNOW everything I will be fine, but as I said earlier, I have stepped away from the day-in, day-out parts and eventhough I have complete faith in Sheila, in the back of my mind, I have that, "Have I forgotten to share something important with her". It is what it is though and we will get through it. I hated it that the dates were what they are. The 20th is the anniversary of my dad passing away, and as much as I hate myself for it, it is there, staring me in the face from the beginning of the day all the way through to the end.....one of those days that my life changed, forever.  I had a client tell me the other day that his life was ruined because his dad died when he was 7. I had to bite my tongue so hard it almost bled. Nobody can ruin your life but you. It is up to you what it is going to be, yes, there may be some that have a harder time getting from point A to point B than others but people, that is what life is about. Let God take control, listen, stop trying to figure out, "Why me" and try to figure out "Why not me" and then make it happen.

Anyway, I know my own life will be a little better once we get through the 20th, this year, for more reasons than one. Today is also a trying day though. A year ago today, my uncle passed away. Talk about an emotional journey. I have had every emotion in the book the last year over him. From being thankful for the way he took care of how he wanted his things taken care of.....and the way he did it made it easier for me in the long run,,,,all the way to wanting to get to Heaven so I could kick him off his cloud for some of the other things he left me with (not to mention what Mom and Robert had to take care of in the line of livestock, pets, etc.). Bottom line though, we used to banter and fuss but we loved each other very much and I miss him, a lot..

So, we are to today. Thursday, we took in the NCHS pops concert, always awesome though I will probably watch Robert's senior year Pops Concert video sometime today as it is my all time favorite...I might be a little biased but oh well.

Last night Andrew and I went to his Goodwill annual banquet, it was quite emotional, but great. So many lives touched. I am so happy that right now, we are in the same line of work, just different aspects of it.

Today I am dragging, two nights past my bedtime and knowing Monday is there to be my Saturday is keeping me from running this morning (though I have every intention of taking time out to go to the Veteran's day ceremony uptown--it's IMPORTANT to remember our freedom isn't free!). Taking the dogs to the groomers this afternoon so just kinda relaxing this morning. Andrew is at the farm, Robert is at work and will go to the farm at noon when he gets off and I am going up this evening to take them supper. I will take some pictures and update his blog for him, he has big news....floors!!  It is a big deal as I think it made it real for him that he is actually going to have a house in a matter of a few months.

I am so very proud of him. When he got his job, his GOOD job, that pays better than every job I had except this one....and I worked several years before making the equivalent of what he started out at; I told him he needed to start paying his car insurance and of course, for the work being done on the house. Because of his past wrecks, car insurance on his own would have been unreal, so we kept him on ours for now. I made him payment books for both the insurance and the house, we figured he would probably pay $300 for an apartment, so that is what he is paying us on his house. He is almost a whole paycheck ahead already on payments. He is responsible enough for the house he inherited and that in itself is wonderful to me. He and his dad is doing all the work themselves and though it's slow, I know from just having the work done on our house this summer, he is saving thousands. The way things are going right now, I expect for him to have his renovations completely paid for in 3-4 years--then it's his, scot free.

Anyway, I'm going to close for now, have another browser open and talking to my other son, Adam, who I am so proud of also.

Happy Saturday!

Mindy



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