Just Busy-ish

Here's the short version of the past month during which I apparently decided I no longer loved my blog enough to write. Which is stupid, because I've missed it:

The spa owners spent three weeks rafting the grand canyon, leaving me nominally "in charge", which meant at one point I worked 11 days straight. For me, that was brutal.

I then started applying for real jobs. Yes. Really. I sent out letters of interest and resumes and everything. There is a causal connection between this activity and being left "in charge" of the spa. While they were gone, something just clicked and I realized that "No. I will not be happy working a mindless customer service job for the rest of my life. I have very little ambition, but what I have is not going to be satisfied by this for much longer." I only applied for two real jobs, but was quickly rejected (one post had already been filled, the other I just never heard back from). So then I was a bit depressed/discouraged. I'm hoping to apply for a few more jobs this week. I'm serious about it now, so if anyone has any leads for jobs in Idaho, let me know. My pay requirements are minimal. (I actually found the perfect job (the one that was already filled, damn it) and determined that I could actually live, just barely, on the low low sum of $35,000/year. So now I at least have a floor of what I need to survive. Good to know I guess.)

And then, last week, I had a bit of a home invasion. On Monday my mom, stepdad, and their two large dogs showed up. On Wednesday, a dear old friend of the family (Howdy) arrived to remove about 500 pounds of horseshoes and a couple of forges that he'd been storing in the chicken coop for about twenty years. Also on Wednesday, fabulously skilled Uncle George arrived to finish a few more projects. These four people have done a HUGE amount of work. Totally makes me embarrassed for all the work I have not been doing. Stepdad and Howdy split and stacked two cords of wood between them. Stepdad bushwacked all the weeds I'd let take over the property and cut down two dead trees. Mom cleaned and planted the flower beds, killed about a million yellow jacket and wasp nests, put insulation in the scary space beneath my dining room floor, and buttressed the woodshed so it will survive another winter. George built a funny little deck off my dining room so he could take out these horrible old windows and install new french doors! (They're doors to nowhere for now since there's a five foot drop from them to the ground, but eventually, someday, there will be a real deck.) Oh, and the neighbors totally regraded my driveway. Yeah. It's been quite a week.

Howdy left on Friday, Mom, Stepdad and the dogs headed out this morning, so now it's just me, George, and the cats. The house seems really empty. As much as I'd kind of been dreading having such a full house, (have I mentioned lately what a hermit I am?) I miss them already.