October, my favorite month, has arrived in a dismal labyrinth of negativity.
There's a reason why I've been posting old reruns on my blog lately. It's because the raw reality of my present situation is so bad that I'm reluctant to reveal it.
Of course it's pouring rain. The rain never stops in Tennessee. Never. Today is thoroughly drenched, dark as the bowels of midnight, growling with ferocious thunder tantrums. The forest trembles in a soggy mist.
Feel free to hold your ears while I voice my troubles and complaints - because I know you don't want to hear them.
I'll force my reluctant self to be mercifully brief:
My car broke down, I'm nearly out of essential supplies.
I'd order some things online, but the ten-foot-high brush on my property is so rampant and obstinate that a delivery truck would never be able to get through.
I've been desperately trying to hack my way through it - with an ax, saws, chainsaws, and pruning shears - but my efforts are largely futile. Impossible to work in the rain.
My blood pressure is through the roof - I almost passed out in the field the other day (no exaggeration)
My washing machine is broke. The water heater isn't working. Clothes dryer is kaput.
The landline phone was completely dead for over a week. I finally messed around with the mysterious fiber optic phone box on the wall - and got it working again.
Miracles occasionally happen.
I'm infested with gnats. Again. The August gnats left in September. The hoards of September gnats are still here, refusing to leave.
I'm infested with mice. Kitzee and Bosco (cats) have been catching them.
Last night at 3:00 a.m. Bosco leaped on my bed with a mouse in his mouth and dropped it right beside me. Talk about a rude awakening....
To hell with my problems.
How about some photos?
The header photo on this post, and the photo below, were taken at dawn yesterday.....everything shrouded in mystical October mists....
My front "yard" this morning (above) drenched in October rain.
There were a few (very few) sunny days in September.
Bosco (above) and Kitzee (below) on the front porch
Time to get out the Halloween mugs (and plates)
my favorite haunted house mug (below), it's about 20 years old (almost as old as me...lol)
Well... I will say you must have the frickin patience of Job.
ReplyDeleteI think I would have lit a match by now and ran.
I'm so sorry to hear your car's kaput, too. Is it possible to push it out onto the road where some hillbilly mechanic can have a go at it? My clothes dryer is still bipolar; but in an effort to conserve electricity, I've taken to using a drying rack with the ceiling fan turned on high. I might have had a heart attack about the mouse, but on second thought, imagine how terrified he/she was? Hang in there!
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ReplyDeleteI am so sorry about all the bad luck you are having - when it rains it pours is NOT an exaggeration! I know how wxpensive it is, but is there ANY way you could get someone else (landscaper, etc.) out to clean up your yard for you?
ReplyDeleteLove your vintage decorations! Fabulous!!!
No phone, no lights, no motor car,
ReplyDeletenot a single luxury,
Like Robinson Crusoe,
It's primitive as can be.
Cool dishes though. Cheryl says: Think you got it bad? We both have poison ivy on our faces! Just figured that out after three days of itching. Luckily, it does not look too bad, but it certainly is irritating. AND we have no idea how we got it. ( have not been in the woods for weeks... perhaps from previous clothing that the wash did not clean up properly.
Well, good luck with the gnats, mice, and rain. Sounds like a good time.
Rain missed us here in Iowa. And I had been planning on it for over a week now. I guess Tennessee keeps "stealing" it from the Midwest... Hehe.
Dear Jon, I offer sympathy and empathy --I got goddamn raccoons! Ran 4 (count 'em! Four!!!!) off my roof midnight Thursday. They've been chewing at my house siding too. I'm definitely getting too old for this! I take a heavy walking stick out and up there and bang it around 'til they quit growling (rabies?) and go away. They weigh about 20 to 40 pounds and have prehensile hands, capable of pulling off roofing and foundation vent-covers. Norma has been on the phone with exterminators and they say raccoons are "protected" but suggested scattering epsom salt all around --otherwise electric fences are efficacious. I have a 100-year-old rifle, inherited from some branch of this hick family, that hasn't been fired in 40 years (shot a couple rats), but will resort to that before I build an electric fence. I can call the county and say, "whole lotta raccoons got run over last night." Or just toss them in the trash. Here's hoping epsom salts solve the problem. I conceded w/Norma that I'll pay arborists take down trees that I used to control, but if that doesn't work, it's guns and raccoons for this boy.
ReplyDeleteBut, are they protected when they are destroying your property? I wouldn't think so.
DeleteI am so sorry about all the things that are broken and not working. Cripes!
ReplyDeleteI would have had a heart attack if a mouse was dropped on my bed beside me! Not fun at all.
I do like your vintage halloween cups and plates. Very cool.
I don't suppose you can get someone out there to look at your car and someone to bring one of those brush cutters out and go over your yard with that? Wendy
When it rains it pours!! OMG! What a mess. I hpe your cousin can help you out.
ReplyDeleteI think you should have gotten a house near town, not one on top of a mountain.
ReplyDeleteHi Jon, I think you need to contact someone with a bush hog to clear some of your property because it looks like way to much for you to do by hand. If your driveway was passable that would eliminate several problems.
ReplyDelete♥️♥️♥️Susan
If anyone has the most things happening at once, that would definitely be you, Jon. Yikes, you would think that everything is conspiring against you, the car, washing machine, phone, yard and it’s the bewitching time of year. It is distressing to read that everything bad is happening at once and making your life miserable. I have read suggestions in the previous comments and wonder if any are viable in terms of finding anyone and also payment. Gnats and mice are annoying to say the least.
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