Friends and snakes

I'm sitting down taking a break and heard a car drive up. I watch to see if the 'customer' will walk in and tell me what she wants or if she's one of those who just starts looking around.

I see a lady start walking toward the front door and as she enters where I can see well, I recognize her. It's a dear friend whom I've not heard from in about 10 years. I'd try to call her, she wouldn't be home or wouldn't answer the phone. She has lots of mental issues-depression, anxiety, etc, so I figure she's off in one of her 'places'. Al-anon taught me to not take these things personal.

Anyway......I jumped up and met her half way. We hugged, sat down and began catching up. Hours passed, with the only breaks being me getting up to wait on customers. Finally I say to her--hon, come on and follow me; I have to pee. So down through the greenhouse, out the door and toward the bathroom we go.

Now--when we built that bathroom, we built it big enough for storage too. I've told ya'll about the shelves and the old freezer in there so you know kinda how it is.

Well, I get to the door and do my normal checking it out before I step in and
Yep......I stepped back and said......Ahh, Jen, I don't think we want to use this potty. We'll go to the house. Lying across my toilet, my toilet mind you is a chicken snake. Well, he/she can have that toilet.

About that time my eyes turned to the freezer and yep......there lay another one on it curled here and there among the pots setting on top of the freezer. Shit. Not 1 but 2 snakes.

After we had gone to the house and peed, I came back to the nursery, got my camera and took off back there again. I got a shot of the one on the freezer, but the one on the toilet had already gone. Jen said he was crawling off as we turned to go to the house.

Then, this afternoon around 5, a guy I went to school with came over to buy some plants. I had not seen him since we finished high school. He's a year or two younger than me, in bad health and has to weigh over 300 pounds. The passenger door was open while his friend bought his flowers for him; so I sat on the floor of the truck and we talked like there had never been 30 some odd years since we'd last seen each other. That just blew my mind because most of the people I run into from high school days are distant, we don't have anything to talk about and it's uncomfortable. Not so with Ottis.

And.......We finished up a whole section of the roof this evening; part of the worst section too.

And......Robby has a few days off work and is coming Saturday to help Terry work on the roof, IF nothing happens between now and then.

And....Stacie has been such help this week, coming in and helping pull some supper together while I helped Terry on the roof; plus the main store manager at WM told her today that she needed to start putting in for different departments in order to learn the departments so she could move on up. He told her he wanted to help her advance.

And.....for some reason I haven't slept worth a toot all week. I think I'm hyper from lack of proper rest.

this and that

Around here, we're finally getting the roof done from Katrina. The patio is fixed and the felt it down. The shingles are off the house except for a patch near the satellite dish. Hopefully by this time next weekend, I can say the roof is done. Poor Terry is doing it all alone, so it will take a while; unless some angel comes along to help him out. I have to tend the nursery and water.

The gardenias are blooming their hearts out and perfuming the yard up, almost to the point of being a bit much for my poor allergies; but they do smell so good. I have much weeding and pruning to do still but will get back on that once the roof is done.

I'm excited about the roof. It's a job I've dreaded having done for a while now. I've also let the patio get it terrible disarray due to the roof being messed up--but Terry was hurt the next year and we couldn't fix it; last year and the year before we just stayed so busy and then he worked with the county--so it wasn't done. And they may call him to work with them starting Monday--but maybe the felt will be one the house and then he can work in the evenings when he comes in. I may can have the watering done and help him too. I just have a tendency to overshoot the roofing nailer and shoot out 2 or 3 nails at a time. :D Maybe I can just position the shingles this time.

Ana is spending a week--supposedly with her friend, Brigette. Brigette stayed with us all last week and attended Bible School. They got along really well and only argued twice, which is great I think. Brigette is a pleasant child to be around so it wasn't any problem.

Mother is still about the same.....no movement in her legs. She has 20 more days that Medicare will pay for her stay in the rehab, then she will have to go home or what? I don't know. I haven't heard them say; pay herself I guess.

I've a good church friend who has something that sounds like mylodsyplasia......her white count is way low. It isn't leukemia yet, but if they can't find a treatment then it will turn into leukemia. Her white count is too low for chemo, her spleen is swollen and they can't do the hormone treatment that is sometimes used for this.

My neighbor has a breast removed last Wednesday and was home on Thursday. We don't know the final result of the testing as to whether she will have to have radiation and chemo or not.

Terry and I are doing fine, just tired

reading

Once I had read all the books appropriate for my age, I moved on Zane Grey westerns and various others whose title escape me.

Grandma had a peach tree that I'd climb up in during the summer and read. Every week when they went to town, I went along so I could return my books and find new ones. I knew the librarian personally and she would always hug me when I came in. Her name was Hattie Pittman. The library sat at the corner of the jail and initally it was just one room. Eventually they expanded it to another room.

The jail, courthouse and library sat on a hill and there were steps going down to a gravel parking area with an artesian well in the middle of it. The area around the jail, courthouse and library was paved of course. Grandpa always parked down 'under the hill'. I'd sit on the top step and start reading while they did their town business.

When I had a new book, there was no time to be wasted shopping. I had to read.

I was not a comic book fan in my youth. I did get some sort of little summer magazine. It was only a few pages, and I'd anxiously await the mailman's coming daily, hoping it would arrive.

The mail man's name was Tate Simmons and he always gave me a piece of Juicy Fruit gum when I met him for the mail, which I did almost daily during summer break.