Burr!

We've got winter weather now. At least cold enough for winter, although the rain is missing at the moment. John and Logan went out to feed after 9 this morning (John was updating Chocolate Alchemy first) and the ground was frozen hard. The forecast says lows in the 20s and 30s (F) tonight -- that's below 0 for those of you in Canada. :-)

I like the cold. I can hear my parents now grumbling about not being able to complain when I chose to live here. My only problem is that Robyn's little electric heater doesn?t get the cabin up to toasty. And the cabin isn't nearly as well insulated as it could be. The floor isn't insulated. The ceiling isn't. The wall I'm next to has insulation but it's board and baton, except the batons aren't on. So there's boards, and then gaps where you can see the insulation, failing to insulate.

So no, we aren't back in the house yet. The plumber, the electrician and the carpenters were supposed to come work during the three day work week before thanksgiving. The electrician actually did. The plumber didn?t even return calls, and the carpenters just failed to show up.

We went to Ty and Susan's for thanksgiving, along with 33 other people (Susan counted!). Their spread included two turkeys and two hams; four types of stuffing; fruit salad, both with and with out cows milk dressing to make sure Logan and I could have some if we chose; a five gallon size pot of mashed potatoes (again, no milk); sweet potatoes; green bean casserole; sauerkraut; rolls, bread, rolls, sticky bun cake, and more rolls; I think I'm still missing some stuff. Oh, and then there was desert - John's favorite part of the excess. Ten pies! All different. Well, there were two chocolate, but it had milk, so I don't know if they were different. Logan had lemon meringue. I had pineapple and coconut, which I've never heard of as a pie but was amazingly good (thank you Lil for all the pies! Lil is part of Susan's very extended family. She is the five and a half foot tall mother of half a dozen giants, who stood around and tried to convince any or everyone that they were starving, never fed, and should be let at the food first, along with the toddlers, all while pushing food at everyone else if one looked at all interested in it. Great family. I think we'll have to adopt Lil.) John had a Venison and custard pie that was called mince, but didn't have the fruit I expect in mincemeat pie.

So today, in the brisk weather, we are off to Steve and Joana's to celebrate Steve and John's birthdays, which got overlooked earlier in the year. At least it will be warm there, And then we'll figure some way to warm the cabin up again when we get home, before crawling under the down duvet.

The van is back, missing radio and battery. John and the insurance company are discussing whether it is totaled. It still runs, so we can still use it as a work vehicle.

The dome, missing plumbing, some electrical, interior doors, refrigerator, and badly in need of cleaning to get the drywall dust and sawdust out, does get warm, when we build a fire in the nice new wood stove. If it weren't for the problems of breathing all the dust, I'd be sleeping there in a sleeping bag.

Yes, I'll get to pictures eventually. Some day when I'm a little less stressed. If that ever comes.

Catching Up,

I know, I know, I haven't posted for ages. I'll see if I can do a bunch of shorter posts to catch up some. I've been spending a lot of time reading, and some working on the house. And then there's me and Logan being out and going most weekdays.

I heard on NPR that there's a group started, I think, by folks in Oregon, called Truth In Voting, who is trying to get the election investigated. I'm all for it. But I can't find the group on the web yet. Kyle sent me a link for an on line petition, here, for investigating the election. I'm not entirely sure that online work. The last time I looked in to it everything I could find said basically they weren't valid. But I'm glad to see the idea is there. I'll try to look again and see if any of what I remember about online petitions has changed.

I've got a ton of pictures to post. Of course none are formatted to drop right in to place here yet. I've got them all the way back to the October birthday celebration, if I could just remember to resize them and all that. I'm going to go take some of the work we've been doing in the dome too. John and Ty have gotten a whole lot of the inside finishing done. Our support pillars are now encased in pretty cedar. And the window casing and framing is all done, in cedar. And the bathroom ceiling is finished in Tongue In Groove cedar that dates from the original builder of the dome -- it was left here, and Jim used some of it, but we've claimed the rest and used it up putting a pretty ceiling in.

Will we be moved in by the US's thanksgiving weekend? No, probably not. But I'll probably have the refrigerator delivered before then, and with luck we'll be getting furniture in during the week after thanksgiving. This week we should see some actual construction people putting on an appearance to do more of their part of the finishing. And then, soon after, I hope, their part of the clean up!

We got a message that speech class was canceled for today, so our day starts a little later for a trip to the chiropractor, and then in to the optometrists to get my eyes checked and my glasses prescription updated. Woo Hoo. If my brain keeps working through this evening I'll try to get something else up here then.