Nice, Mr_David!
I'm seriously thinking of getting solar panels out here-- now that the house is no longer covered by that poor tree, we get a lot of sun. We do use a lot of electricity though. But even if we only ran some things off of it, it could reduce our monthly bill-- and more importantly, we might not have to worry about the damn power outages when some idiot shoots a line while trying to hit a squirrel or someone drives into a powerline or a tree falls on the lines or when it's raining and the power goes out for some reason.
It has been raining almost every day here. I keep wishing we could find a way to harness the rain to generate electricity-- like set up a gutter system where when the water flows through it turns something that generates electricity-- Toto has something similar to charge the batteries in some of their automatic faucets-- using the water in the faucet for 5 minutes a day recharges the battery apparently.
Still waiting on my brother to get his engine out of the back of my truck but he's been waiting for a lull in the rain. Found someone who will put it in for $300 if the weather will just clear up long enough.
Had a water line break outside (the PVC shattered) in the middle of the night. I went out to the pump house to see what was wrong- no leaks out there but the water in the holding tank was low. On my way back in I saw the broken line-- right below the shutoff. I had to shut the main line off and wait until morning.
Got up early the next morning, found the supplies I needed, and went outside to fix it. Was cutting off the broken part (it was right outside the back steps) and got headbutted by a few cats and then had my face licked by the dog. Fortunately, they left me alone when I got the pvc cement out. I wrapped the pipe up in insulation and duct tape afterward, left it for a couple of hours, and then turned the water back on.
I can't remember if I mentioned that my doctor diagnosed me as having hypothyroid. It explains why I was absolutely exhausted all the time. I'm still tired, but I'm feeling a little bit more alert-- just not by much. I'm hoping that the Levithroxin will work better after longer use. This weather isn't helping much though. Feels like a sauna outside when I open the door.
On a complete side note, I was talking to alefromitaly about traveling methods in the US. I don't travel very much anymore, so I'm wondering if people know much about travel accommodations for people who want to travel in groups across multiple states. Like, which car rental places are good, what places are good to visit, and what sort of motels/hotels are inexpensive but safe?