Attila and I enjoyed the month of September, in which we went on a working holiday at the little house and then returned to work and chores at the country house.
I’ve spent much of the last two weeks catching up with paying bills and working through all the paperwork generated by our two weeks of work at the little house. That was one expensive holiday. Also, there was a very high pile of bills and documents waiting for my attention when I arrived home, and they have taken up almost all of my free time since. I have almost caught up with all these fiddly bits!
Our next project at the little house is to get the furnace working. Cold weather is on the way! The furnace needs a bit of attention, even though it is only a few years old. Actually, it is the duct work that needs all the attention. Previous renovators installed a new bathroom floor, which completely covered the heating vent. One has to wonder what they were thinking. We will have to cut through the floor in the bathroom to release the heat into the room. Also, the cold air return was almost completely blocked (don’t ask!) and now needs to be taken to bits and rebuilt.
At our country house Attila is working steadily to bring all our wood into the wood shed. He has made real headway on the project; it is a lot of hard work. I am working six days next week, and so will wait to the following week when I have more time off, to begin charging the masonry heater for the winter. In the meantime Attila is building evening fires in the little wood stove in the basement, which is keeping the house at a comfortable temperature.
I brought the geraniums into the house this evening, as the temperature could drop to zero over the weekend. These are my first geraniums. I’m hoping to put them in a dark place for the winter and bring them back out in the spring. I won’t be putting a garden in pots on the deck at the country house next summer, although I may plant some tomatoes and such at the little house. That is a big maybe, because gardens need regular attention and I may not be able to supply it.
Attila and I sit in our chairs at the end of our long, satisfying days, and most evenings we are waiting for bedtime! Aren’t we exciting! To go to bed too early is disastrous, as we wake up far too early in the morning and then are tired anew when we toddle off to work.
I haven’t been taking all that many pictures of late, and they take quite a while to prepare for Internet publication. Tonight I fear that if I try to find and edit a photo, this entry won’t make it to the server at all. So I’ve forgone my usual image, for the sake of expediency.
Worldly Distractions
Weather
12 C
Condition: Cloudy
Pressure: 101.5 kPa
Visibility: 16 km
Temperature: 12.0°C
Dewpoint: 4.3°C
Humidity: 59 %
Wind: NW 13 km/h
Quote
“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald
1896 – 1940
