Day Sixty-four: "Putzing" outside

Well, that is what I always called it when Marilyn did it. She would do the one thing outside over the million things inside. I don't know how many pruning sheers she went through. At the time I didn't think they were worn out from use but now I'm not so sure. I didn't use pruning sheers but loppers. I don't believe I wore them out but I certainly wore myself out.

Before I could wash my vehicles, I needed to sweep my driveway. Before I swept my driveway, I decided to trim away the bottle brush bush that was hanging over the fence from my neighbor's yard. I carefully cut it up the fence line and had a mass, a mess of a mass of trimmings I now had to fit into the green bin. This involved a lot of cutting of the branches, which I endeavored to do over the bin itself. Since the branches did what branches do, they branched, and they also were longer than the top of the green bin, I would frequently make a cut and have one or both sides fall off of the bin to the driveway. I took care sometimes to minimize the fall off and other times I just let the clips fall where they may.

I don't know which way was faster but after about four hours and two additional small bins I had the driveway cleaned. This meant that it wasn't really too late to wash at least one car, but my arms ached and It was past time for dinner. (Not that I need any excuse to procrastinate on work.)

Earlier today I took my truck out to go to the Faucets and Fixtures warehouse to pick up the toilet I ordered over a month ago. On the way I stopped to get gas and realized that I hadn't put the next year's sticker on the license. Thank goodness I was only a mile away from my house and didn't have a specific appointment to pick the toilet up. After my truck was legal, I made my way to my new toilet. It's a one piece unit and took two of us to lift it into the truck. Probably it wouldn't have, since I was able to offload it by myself, but the sole person who brought it out only picked up one side. If I hadn't picked up the other side it would have fallen to the ground instead of get to the bed of my truck.

For all my work in various positions as a scouter helping my son through Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts, I still don't know knots. But, the rope I tied the toilet box into my truck didn't come loose and the box didn't slide around.

Since I was close Whole Foods and it was lunch time, I went there to eat. I like their selection and I am a minor share holder. More minor than I once was: I still have the same number of shares, but their value has dropped close to 60% since I bought them. Poor timing is the mark of Life after Layoff. I lose my job and lose my investment.

I don't feel down at all. In fact, today I had another idea that may even be worth a book. At least it is something that I'm looking forward to putting on my list, researching, and writing. With the number of my projects that involve writing, maybe I'm just looking forward to writing. I know I look forward to writing this every day. Since there are rarely comments, I don't know whether it is even read. I still enjoy writing it.