Sunday Febuary 5, 2012 Noon

I've got to catch up.  My hair continues to fall out at an alarming rate.  My fingernails have split into the quick, and I am now wearing glue-on nails to prevent injury and infection.  Janie wants to get me in to see my endocrinolgist as soon as possible, and I'm all for it, if he can help me.
I'm to the point of using a full-cap wig, as my vanity just won't permit me to wear baseball caps or be seen in public bald.  I've never been able to wear them, so this will be an adventure.
The work at Creekside is going along smoothly.  Stucco is still gone.  Janie and I are working with this fellow, Jr, who has some emotional problems, but is a good worker with a great attitude.  He helped me with some styling on the dining room windows that turned out perfectly.  They look as if they were always that way, and the products are very low maintenence, I had them in stock, and they were cheap....all which I just LOVE.
He has two of the upstairs bedrooms ready for primer, except for a little window trim, and I'm glad for that.  We will have to get the trim pieces that he needs to finish, but it's fairly common, and Janie and I will probably go get the pieces this week, early.  He is off Monday for a doctor's visit, and that will give us the chance to get the supplies he needs.
He did a general clean-up of the yard on Friday, and he did a really good job.  He used some paving stones to make a sidewalk in the back yard, so we can stay up out of the mud.
Janie and I went to the Habitat in Dandridge on Friday, and they had a piano and an old antique organ that had been electrified, and I demonstrated them for Miss Ann.  She recognised my hymns, and sang along with them.  I told her that I liked that, as it meant that I was playing well and that she knew the songs of the church.  She's the general manager there, and I like having her as a friend.
Janie got a good deal on some plywood and siding for her Hobby Hut. 
One of Carzel Owen's sons gave me a new set of wood bi-fold doors that had come in to the trash dump that morning.  I'll probably use them for shelving, but I was glad to get them.  They're going to call us if they get any more siding.  Janie will be glad to hear that.
Cherokee has not been by to see us.  We asked about her at the Goodwill, but they don't see much of her, either.  She did not look well the last time I saw her, and I worry about her health.
I took Barbara some things at Tangles on Friday morning, and got to see Elizabeth for a while.  She is such an awesome lady, with so many stories to tell about her past, which is considerable...She's 97 years old, and her mind is as sharp as ever.  I adore her, as does almost everyone else, and she's so much fun that she wins new friends every day.  She's really fit into the culture of Blaine, Rutledge, and East Tennessee.  Darla Daniel does her hair, and they just love each other.  Darla dotes on her clients, and everyone who knows her loves her, too.
The girls at Tangles love to hear me and Barbara 'go at each other'.
I told Barbara that I had her another Christmas present, but I would have to bring it to her house in the truck...It would be a pair of shoes.  Everyone loved the reference to her big feet.
I'd buy her a dress if the fabric outlet carried enough material to cover her.  They carry foam rubber there, too, but she don't need any more padding.  She needs more Jenny Craig and less Sarah Lee.
Skunks are all over all the roads, having been hit by cars during their very early mating.  It's like spring now, with hardly any cold days in the very recent winter.  My Jonquils are in bloom, and it always snows on Jonquils.  I don't think we will have much winter.  It's been nice to not have such high heating bills.
The wood stove at Creekside is a lot of work, but Janie and I keep the place nice and warm with it.  We made a trip to Clairemont to get firewood one day while it was a little dry last week.  We were able to pull the truck down into a pasture where there was wood stacked, and it saved a LOT of heavy carrying.
I have been working under the house, and I was appalled at the scarcity of nails in the floor support system.  I started nailing the boards together better, and it turned into a three-day project, but the floor in the downstairs sun room no longer bounces when you walk on it.  It's an amazing difference.  I shudder to think what might have happened if I had not caught that situation.  Other people, in the past, had gone under and put upright supports, but had not secured the 2X10's to each other, and that's what made the difference.  Some of the cross-members had come loose from the foundation, and seemed ready to totally drop the whole floor.  It's better now.
Betty Pike should be able to speak in meeting about some foundation work from that experience.  Her father got a good laugh at me years ago when I told him that my barn was built on a huge rock, and he and Maw Pike came out to my farm and saw that rock.  It's still there, as is the barn, which was built from Wormy Chestnut.
That wood really lasts.  The huge timbers in the floor of Creekside are Chestnut, too.  They're worth a tremendous amount of money, because Chestnut trees in the U.S. were wiped out by disease in the earlier days of America.
I'm glad the Lord has blessed me with having so much.  I wish He'd now consider giving me the strength to care for it all as I wish to.
I haven't heard from Lynn.  I don't know how her health is now.  Steve has been lucky to have all his immediate family still.  I don't know how he will deal with it when they begin to die, as we all will.
There was some younger man in the Truth who died week before last, according to an e-mail from Betty.  I didn't know him, so I didn't send anything or go to the funeral.
An old school mate from Dante died last week....Gary Bell.  They had lived across the creek from us when we were children.  He was a really nice boy when we were growing up.  He's had two brothers and his father preceed him in death.  One was his twin, who we always called Runt.
I often think of some of the old neighbors in Dante.  Many are still there.  It seems like many of the Fine families are getting gone.
We're getting low on hay here, and it's good to see the longer days and the sunshine, which will grow some grass for the cows.  I have two young bull calves that I need Ed Bowling to get to auction for me, while beef is high.
The peacocks are growing their tails and strutting, so mating for them is not far behind.  I want to breed my Jave Green male to some hens.  He's magnificent, and they bring a LOT of money.
Janie wants a peacock, but doesn't know if he'd last at her place.  They make good watchdogs.
I can mimic a male calling and get mine to yelling.  Well, I could before this throat pestilence.
I hate having to give up on singing.  I used to love to sing along with BBN, a Christian radio channel.  I don't have a song now.  I can listen, though.  And learn.
It will soon be time to mow.  I'm not going to neglect the lawns at Clairemont this year.  They still look bad from the scant service of last year.  I'll have to take one day a week to work here this summer.
Janie and I are going to have a spring cleaning day, and probably a yard sale after it, to bring Clairemont back into shape and good form.  It's a shame to neglect such a lovely home and grounds, which Steve and I both worked so hard to have.
The white Dodge truck, which is my favorite, is still not running right, and I'm going to have to have it towed or hauled on a roll-back to get it to someone to repair it.  I'd like to get it to Gordon Treese, if he has the time to work on it.  It's in the transmission or the 4-wheel drive works, but I have no idea what it is.  It's a lot easier on fuel than the big red Dodge pick-up, and it has the enclosed camper, which is nice for hauling home my treasures found at Goodwills and yard sales.
Lakeshore Road has 18 miles of yard sales in the spring and fall, and I want to be ready for that this spring.  Lynn said some time ago that she wants to come and go with me, but she'd better make a reservation.  Janie and I are planning to go.  We really should take a tractor-trailer rig.
I need to get busy with real work.  I've been writing this for over an hour, and Steve must be thinking I'm having an on-line affair by now.