This will be short and quick because there's so much to do in so little time. We'll leave fairly early Wednesday morning for Seattle where we'll celebrate my mom's 93rd birthday on the 24th. It comes on Christmas Eve every single year, which means we've almost never been able to be there because of my pastoral duties. So this first year of "retirement" we're not going to miss it.
On the way up we'll stop at The Grubstake Cafe in Harrisburg for breakfast (BACON!) and then at a mobile home dealer in Albany to look at their model of the D River. We should be in Seattle by early or mid-afternoon.
On the way home we'll stop in Junction City to pick up a window for Fred's loft. All the insulation is in and most of the electrical, with just the light switch wiring left to do. I'll use cedar boards for the front, accent wall and for the two short sections along each side and then do the rest in drywall. I haven't decided if I'll do that before or after I finish out the bottom level.
As I type this I'm listening to the rain coming down in buckets, which will add to the 1" we've already received today. We also had 30+ mph winds earlier that knocked out power for 2 hours this afternoon. We'd been told to expect that to happen several times through the winter so there wasn't any panic, but the implications for rural living did gradually dawn on us. It means no water from the well, which means no, uhm, plumbing. It means no phone because our cell phones don't work here and the land line goes down. No internet because the modem and router are dark.
So basically the only reasonable thing to do is take a nap.
Lindsey Graham dropping out is bad news for Donald Trump, which is good news for America. Graham's supporters will now move to one of the other candidates (none to Trump!) which will strengthen them, raising their poll numbers. More than that, John McCain, an elder statesman in the party who had supported his good friend Graham, will eventually transfer his endorsement, providing a boost to someone.
In The Small World Department, I've mentioned that there's a couple at church, probably in their 50's, who are originally from Costa Rica. We were pleasantly surprised to learn they're from the city of Belen, a suburb of the capital of San Jose, the same place I was in September. They're really nice, fun to talk with, and very interesting. She's an opera singer who now performs, teaches and coaches, and he's a classical pianist who accompanies and leads rehearsals for the Eugene opera company as well as teaching music and Spanish at a local school.
As Gustavo and I talked before the service yesterday morning we discovered that years ago, while living in CR, they attended the same church where I led the seminars.
But wait! There's more!
I took a picture of Gustavo and Karen with my phone and emailed it to Alonso; "Recognize these two?" (I knew he would because they told me they remembered him.)
Minutes later I got an email back: "Are those your Tico friends there?? They sang at our wedding!"
What are the chances?!
The church had a Christmas party last night with pizza and pot-luck desserts. Our table of seven won a trivia contest because Pam knew the answer to all the movie questions and I knew the Bible questions. The ratio of movie to Bible was 10 to 1, but I'm still claiming my share of the notoriety.
OK, dinner is down, the football game is well underway, and it's time for me to move on to the next project in preparation for our trip. I've taken a bunch of pics so my folks can see that we're not really living like 18th century pioneers, and I need to get them cleaned up and in an order that makes sense.
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