Family Mellmann

In the midst of rental projects, house construction, chauffeuring Katherine to and from work, and household duties, I enjoy sitting on the patio getting some stitches in on my current knitting project.

In twenty-five years of living in Vermont, we saw some wild weather; big snows, ice storms, high winds, lots of rain...but I don't think we ever had so much rain fall from the sky at one time that the roads turned to rivers and the air turned to water.  It doesn't last long (the rain slowed down to a more civil "drizzle" in less than ten minutes) but it's pretty amazing to watch.  This raid took place on Monday (August 12th). When it rains like this, rocks and dirt get washed into the streets.  Within one or two days, the town sends out their street sweepers (the big machines that vacuum up debris and clean the roadways) to clean things up.  I have seen more sweeping action here in two months than I saw in twenty-five years in Vermont. This is one of the street sweepers.  I captured this picture at the end of the 4th of July parade.  In Vermont, the end of a parade is declared by the police car that rolls through as the last vehicle.  Here in Livingsto...

For the past few weeks, it has been quite warm here in Livingston.  On top of the heat, we have been "socked in" (surrounded) by smoke from wildfires burning west of here.  In the past few days we have received some rainy weather which brought cooler temperatures and it cleared the air a little bit...for a little while. While I was working at my computer, I saw some weather rolling in and decided to record it.  Next time I'll record it in time-lapse, but if you grab the progress bar and scroll forward (or back) you can see how the clouds hide the mountains and then clear away.  Or, you can spend six minutes and just listen to the wind and rain. :)

According to Maslow's Hammer, or the law of the instrument, it is common to rely on one tool for most routine jobs.  We have twisted this "law" into a saying that is commonly used; "If you're a hammer, everything is a nail.".  Have you ever bought a new car and then notice that everyone seems to be driving the same car? Well, it turns out that when your son becomes a commercial pilot, you start seeing airplanes everywhere. On my way back to Livingston, after visiting the construction site, I caught up to a freight train heading west and carrying six commercial jet bodies.  Since my highway speed limit is higher than the train's speed limit, I passed it eventually. Back in Livingston, which is home to an active train yard, I found that same train idling in the yard.  I wonder where the wings are. So, trains moving on to Billings or Bozeman (Montana) will stop here in Livingston to pick up extra engines (let's call them "booster packs") to he...

The foundation work has begun.  Footings were poured today.  The rest of the foundation work will hopefully happen next week, once the ICFs (insulated concrete forms) arrive. While I was on site to take a few pictures of the foundation preparation, the cement trucks started to arrive; first the pump truck then the cement trucks (4 cement trucks would come for this part of the job). The guy in the white shirt (with a long beard) is the man in charge.  And the skinny guy with the baseball cap is the one who controls the flow of cement. The moral of this photo...be the guy with the tech if you can; the rest have to do the physical labor.

Katherine has been working full time for a couple of weeks now and has settled in quite well to the new routine.  She reports that she is even starting to recognize "regulars".  Now she's looking forward to receiving her first full paycheck.

After about two weeks of high heat during the day and modest cooling at night, we are enjoying a little reprieve.  A weather front rolled through this evening bringing cool temperatures, a good breeze (clearing away some of the wildfire smoke), a little rain, and a lovely double rainbow.  After about 30 minutes, the rainbows disappeared, the rain moved on, and a lovely blue sky was exposed for the first time in many many days.

Katherine has put in her first full week of work, and it will come as a surprise to those who know her that she is actually enjoying the job.  She reported that it's "fun", yet she admits that standing in one place all day long is hard on the legs and feet (no surprise to anyone) but hasn't complained at all.  She even pointed out that she hasn't complained because she realizes her lack of physical conditioning is a problem of her own making. I managed to convince her to put her hair in a ponytail so now she's (finally) learning to manage (beyond just brushing) her own hair.  I think her new look makes her more...approachable.  I like being able to see her face. 😃 As we sat in the local Thai restaurant, waiting for our take-out meal to be ready, we talked and talked and talked.  This whole working thing seems to be helping to bring her out of her shell and it also gives her some new material about which we can talk.

The initial digging is pretty much done and ready for the arrival of the "cement guy" who is finishing up another project before starting ours.  On this day, it was a lovely 75 degrees (F) (after nearly two weeks of brutal heat) and the smoky skies (due to wildfires west of us in Idaho, Oregon, and California) cleared a bit so that I could see some of the mountains.   Next stop, hopefully, footings and foundations.