Catching Up

  Three days with no electricity (not so much of a problem). Three days with almost no internet service (impossible to blog).

Anyway, what I did was go to the Adirondacks to particpate in a trail work day. The North Country Trail didn't have a route across the Adirondack Park for almost 30 years. Little by little, now, agreements are being made which is giving the trail an actual treadway. It has been a dream of mine to help build that, even in some small way. But I live 15 hours away.

So when Mary Coffin, who has spearheaded this effort, posted that there was a work day this past Saturday, I had to go. It was a few hours drive back to the east, but nothing near 15. I camped near Mason Lake. A rainbow welcomed me that first evening. Next morning, I drove to town and met the other people who also came to volunteer. Of course, I knew Mary, but I also knew one other woman who came. Mary's husband Bill was there as well, but he isn't able to do the physical work any more.

A ski resort named Oak Mountain has given permission to build trail across their property, which will eliminate a road walk. A tentative route had been flagged. We checked and adjusted that, and began defining the treadway. We raked, cut branches and some roots, and put up blazes. We completed almost a mile. "Completed" isn't really the correct word, because there is a lot of benching to do to level the trail and remove rocks. But it is able to be walked and followed by a hiker. Going back to the campsite that afternoon, a mother bear and three cubs crossed the road in front of us. I was only fast enough with the camera to catch the last cub scooting under the guardrail. Mary and I went out again the next morning. Our goal was to follow a snowmobile route which would connect the trail we built on Saturday with the next road. This is not ideal, but for right now, our trail has been given permission to use that established route. We crossed Whiskey Brook near where we began our walk. Despite many junctions, we managed to make all the correct decisions, and connected with the work we'd already done. Mary took GPS readings, and we flagged it with tape. Hopefully we'll soon have permission to put up the blue blazes. When we got back to Oak Mountain, we did do some more of the blazing. In most places, the NCT blazes are painted. However, within the Adirondacks, they requested the nail-up style, so that is what is being used. this four-mile reroute which can now be followed eliminates a seven mile road walk! After Mary and Bill left, I had a mission. Two of them. I wanted to get a few pictures that were "real" Adirondacks. This scenic view comes cheaply, as it's seen from a roadside turnout. You don't have to work to be rewarded. But it's pretty neat anyway. This is not the High Peaks, but is a view to the southeast. This panorama made so small isn't nearly as spectacular as it is in real life. And the other part of my mission was to find one of my best friends. He and his wife live only 20 miles from where we were working, but I hadn't been able to get in touch with him. I decided to just drive there. I knew he wasn't in the same house as the last time I visited, but I had hopes that I could locate him. And I did! This is Paul, one of my very best friends in the world. In fact, he introduced me to the Adirondack Mountains, 55 years ago. Did you ever have a friend that just resonates with your soul? Nothing romantic between us, ever. But we just seem to "know" each other. We had a great visit, prayed together, and they fed me. What a perfect ending to this Adirondack visit. I suppose we look a little older than that week we climbed Haystack and Skylight so long ago, but we don't care. Now, I'm beginning to work my way back west. I'm with Irene again tonight.

Miles of NCT hiked- a total of about 6. Total for 2020: 211

North Country Trail near Speculator, NY, from Oak Mountain Resort to NY 30

 

See R&GV Rail Club

One More Shift

 
It's starting to feel real. I have ONE more shift to work and I'm officially done with being a newspaper mailroom "lead bundler" (almost typed lead bungler!), and will start being a full-time author.



I asked if I could do the final run tonight instead of my trainee. Yes. I get to go out with a last hurrah! Everybody at work was super nice. They gave me a party. Omer brought Omer-style salad (green M&Ms). There were brats and salads and cake. The little banner is a gift from SIL Loretta (she wanted me to open her gift at the party, and also sent a cool t-shirt).


Here's a link to a video on Facebook of me opening my other presents. It was perfect. They got me peanut butter and pickles because that is my favorite sandwich and they've watched me eat several hundred of them by now. The rest of the staff even contributed to the meal with brats and chips. That was pretty special- usually the mailroom folks just do their own thing.

So, here's a nice neat view of the mailroom under operation. It's been a good place to work.



And Michelle, who is taking over for me. Hopefully we've done the training well enough that the transition will go smoothly. I've sure tried.




The drivers mostly said last goodbyes because we generally only see a few of them Friday nights. Most of the papers get stacked on the dock (unless things go horribly wrong, and we don't wish for that tonight!) I like to think I've improved relations between the mailroom and the drivers while I've been there.

This is possibly the longest I've ever kept any one job, except for being self-employed. I'll miss the people for sure. Thanks for the memories. Tomorrow I'm reborn with a different definition.

	See First day in the mailroom, December 2012
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Anything But White!

 
Today was one of those days where many many little things didn't go so well. One of which was not getting home from work till almost 5 pm. But this blog is about the good things.

So, hey! The snow is actually and finally melting bigtime.

It was warm enough and golden-lit enough that the birds came out at sunset and tried to do a little singing. Here's a robin. Nothing spectacular, but I'll take it!



And the cloud cover lifted a bit too, allowing us to have a nice pastel sunset.



Two more work shifts and I'm done! Can you believe that? Have I actually announced this here? I can't seem to find that I did. I'm officially going to be a writer, and no more wrestling bundles of papers around. Leaving Monday on a trip. SO much to do before then...

In other news: I didn't accomplish a single thing after I got home, and I'm going to bed early. So there.

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The Ordinary Things

 
Just want to share a great couple of lines from a P.D. James mystery, of all places. Quite profound. A boy asks a priest about his diary "It's just an ordinary diary then, Father? It isn't about your spiritual life?"

The Father answers," This is the spiritual life; the ordinary things one does from hour to hour."

Cattails are pretty ordinary- yet the rhythm in this spray of winter-bent stalks made me smile.



Today at work we shared a meal of "humble" vegetables (cabbage, carrot, potato, rutabaga) with a bit of sausage. Cornbread for counterpoint. There's a meal that's been ordinary for multiple centuries. But, with friends and the satisfaction of a rather crazy work morning (that stretched till 2 pm) behind us, the ordinary is elevated to something extraordinary.





Cattails or soup or printer's ink... if you are looking for meaning, you will find it. If you are working for Someone beyond your own fulfillment or paycheck or for praise, you'll always be satisfied.

Work again tonight- and I need to take my own advice.

	See Sunlit
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Tired of Work Lists?

 
I'm sharing a sunset again, because it's at least a spot of color in the gray Michigan winter. It seems like I haven't been doing much outside lately and am only telling you what kinds of work I get done. Seems a little boring.



Other winters, I have sometimes taken you on a past journey through my memories. I have one I've sort of been saving, but currently my scanner isn't working. So I'll have to just take pictures of pictures for some of it. Maybe we'll do that anyway.

Today, though, you just get another work list. We did get the blue stacker working, and then tweaked things to get the kinks out. This included adding a set of rollers near the top to make it fit better into our conveyor setup. Beth figured it out, and the boss was impressed!

But work took longer than I expected and then I had errands.

When I got home, I went out intending to get that well cover close to done. Nope. At least it's warm enough that I could get the concrete blocks and rocks off the tarp that had been frozen in. This allowed me to access all of the wood. The "problem" is that some of it isn't in terrible shape. I couldn't get enough leverage, alone, to pull away some of the plywood.

Most of the framing is modern dimensioned 2x6s, and much of that is just fine. So I can't mix that with the old 2x8s. I'll buy the needed pieces tomorrow, and Michelle from work and Joe are coming Saturday to help me.

So much for that. The weather is supposed to be cooperative for outside projects.

I'm working on Chapter 2 of The Hitchhiker.

I think I've had more than my share of publicity today with the great article on the front page of the Ludington Paper that is being shared around Facebook. If you haven't seen it, it's linked below.

	See Local Author, Joan H. Young, Completes Fifth Book in Mystery Series
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Stacking Papers, Covering Holes (Almost)

 
The "new" blue stacker is making its way closer to being usable! Tech guy was there all day. Here he is getting things ready to add the rollers where the papers make the transition from the stacker to the conveyor belt.



Then it was moved closer to its niche, and plugged into the air and the electric- you can see the line/cord. Everything lit up correctly and we watched it cycle a few times. The old brown one is still in its spot on the right



However, we still had to put papers out the window, and that without any stacker at all. That means we pull them off the end and count by hand, which is a fairly energetic project, but we got it done!

My understanding is that the stacker is now in place and we'll be using it tomorrow!

He also replaced the belt that takes papers from the strapper out the window to drivers. That was a real mess, and I am VERY appreciative of having this fixed because it makes one less thing I have to carefully monitor (it was ripping up papers if you didn't do things just right.)



I was supposed to get the framework for the well pit cover made this afternoon. That didn't quite happen. I did get the boards collected, measured and marked. That was the best I could do, since I had another meeting at 6. Hopefully, tomorrow afternoon will have fewer surprises, and I'll get it done. It's also supposed to be quite warm tomorrow- above 40 degrees!



The other surprise of the day was that I thought I had a gas leak in the kitchen. Turned out to not be true, but that chewed up a fair amount of time.

	See Well, Well Cover
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Some Things Are Looking Better

 
I will confess to being a tiny bit grumpy yesterday. Sorry!

Today, we had heat at work. That's a big plus.

Beth decided she wanted to make burgers and homemade fries for everyone. She was the chef.



We brought all the fixin's, and healthy appetites.



I made the buns last night. They are good, but I forgot how big to make the balls of dough, so they were more like slider buns. We ate 'em anyway.



Dig right in!



The electricians were there, so I think the wiring is ready, or nearly ready for the "new" stacker. They also used their handy lift cart to change a couple light bulbs for us. Much safer than how we usually do them with the fork lift.



Still no water, but I've got the well pit warmed up. Now I just have to get the pump guy back here to figure out what damage was done.

I'm brain-cooking a new design for a decent cover for the well pit. I also shoveled some of the dirt out that the miserable animal-whatever it is- has moved into the pit. Really a LOT of dirt. And getting it out would be MUCH easier with two people- one in the hole and one above.

In other news: I mailed some books. That's just about it, except for little stuff. I'm chilling before heading back to work. Have good hopes for some writing progress this weekend. The Book Launch party at BookMark in Ludington is tomorrow at 4 pm!

	See Fix-it Day at Work
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Fix-it Day at Work (Sort of)

 
We had a repairman with us at work all day. First he got the front station on the inserter working, which has been non-functional for two weeks. No picture of that.

Next he replaced this belt that was really torn up. It's just spread out on the floor here, to measure for the new piece, but you can see it was completely split up the middle.



It's part of the belt system that carries papers up the wall. Here's where it came off of. It goes around those exposed rollers.



He was going to also replace the belt that carries papers from my station out the window, but that didn't happen for some reason.

He was also going to hook up our new to us (refurbished) stacker.



Guess again. Now we have to have an electrician come before that can be accomplished, and we have a large inanimate object to work around for another unknown length of time.

The strapper didn't heal itself in my absence either, so we have to do the little dance with the strap reel for who knows how long. That's making my hip ache. We've looked at the manual and on line, and can't even actually figure out what part is causing the problem. Clearly not the part that's listed in the troubleshooting guide. If we take it apart now, before the current reel of strap is used up, that will all be trash because they just come unwound if you take them off, mid-reel. So, I'm sure we won't even look at it till it's empty.

And there is still no heat at work. Only in our room... We are special.

And there is still no water here. I thought the heater I bought was defective. I could not get it to turn on in the well pit this morning even though the little light said it was getting power. So I took it to work and it was fine (although it couldn't make a dent in heating our huge room). Brought it back and it still wouldn't work in the well pit. What the heck, right?

Took it to the house, and it's fine. I finally figured out that the sensor to turn it off if it tips is REALLY sensitive. I'll have to go back down in the pit with a board and a level because there is only has a dirt floor, which that clever animal has dug up. What fun. I should do that before I go to work in the morning. We'll see.

I went out to catch you another sunset because color is GOOD!

I also caught the red-tail hawk. Not a great pic, but I'll take it. S/he always makes me smile.





Bed soon. We hand-stuffed papers for hours today because we couldn't run the machines while the guy was working on them. I'm bushed.

	See The Stacker
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Mailroom Christmas Party 2017

 
Today was the Christmas party at work, and we nailed it! But you already know we are good at that. We lined up three piles of pallets to make a "table," and had pretty plastic tablecloths. Add pizza and lots of finger foods. We all ate till we could truly eat no more!



My contribution to the finger foods was a really easy relish tray. It looked great, but was immensely simpler to create than the penguins made in a previous December.


The gift exchange was fun. We each drew names, and the strangest thing is that it turned out to be four sets. For example, I drew Heather and she drew me, and ditto three other times. Of course we didn't know this had happened until today. The rule this year was the the gifts had to be homemade.

Heather takes some of the strapping bands that come on pallets of inserts and other shipments and weaves baskets. Here's the one she made for me as a gift. And, yes, it's filled with cookies... dark chocolate and craisin. Mmmmmm...



Here's where it gets funny. The day we drew names, I was planning in my head what crafty thing I would make. Then Heather grabbed me and said, "You need to know that books count as homemade, and whoever you get (except Michelle, who already bought the books), wants a set for their gift."

So when I actually got Heather, that was the end of craft planning! All I had to do was wrap up a set of books.

And we finally remembered to take a nice group picture with all the current employees in the Mailroom. We work well together, and "the people" is one of the best things about this job.



In other news: I am getting back to the first of the children's mystery books. I'm really stuck on Chapter 10. I think it should contain certain information, but every time I try to write that, it just feels intrusive. I think I have to let the story happen in the way that feels right, and get this info in later. I'm sure I'll sort it out, but it's being surprisingly stubborn.

We managed to do three runs of actual publications, in addition to the party, so we only have two to do tonight. I don't go in till 11 pm, an hour later than usual. And I get Tuesday after Christmas off, so there will be a nice break after work and sleep.

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