Last month as I was preparing to head to school for my final, I spilled coffee all over me. I changed and when I went downstairs to put the clothing in the washing machine I found water all over the tile floor FRACK!!!

I had just prior to this taken a shower and done some laundry; which meant the pipes into the septic were root clogged like they were once before the pandemic. Back then we had Roto-Rooter come out and clear the pipe and tell us the pipe would have to be fixed, eventually. Then the pandemic started and we did not get it repaired. I knew this day was coming. 

The water wasn't deep so I grabbed some old towels to keep it away from seeping towards the carpeted stairs. I grabbed the wet/dry vac from my studio and started sucking up the water. After I the floor taken care of I also turned on a fan in the hallway plus the A/C to help dry the tiles and grouts. I then left to school and would call Roto-Rooter from campus when I had calmed down.   

Once at school I scheduled a service visit for the next day, Friday. Not only would they clean the pipe, located the intrusion and discuss repair options.  After the final was over, several of us from class went to dinner and I had a blueberry mojito cause I need it.  Note: I did fantastic on my final project presentation and not only got a 100% on the project but again, a 100% for the class.  When I got home the floor was dry and I put all the wet towel in the washing machine to let them drain and dry - I knew I was not going to be using it anytime soon.

When Roto-Rooter came on Friday, they first pulled the washing machine out of the closet so they could get to the drain. Then they roto'ed out the pipe. Next was to put the camera snake down the pipes to locate the issue which was just before the septic tank.  The camera has a sensor on it so using something like a metal detector they could locate where the camera was.  Then we went out side to determine where along the slab the intersection point would be. Luckily the point in question was about 1/3 of the way in from the left side of the house AND that part of the house is on piers, not a poured foundation. This meant they could trench/tunnel in and under to get to the pipe that had to be fixed. I got a very expensive quote and signed the paperwork to get it all started. The repair would cost more than a year's tuition at State school $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$.

Work was to start the following Monday - 2 or 3 days of trenching then a day to repair the pipe(s) and a day to put all the dirt back. And of course, it RAINED over the weekend into the next week so everything was delayed since the trench would fill with water.   Eventually the trenching was almost done but a rather large rock was found right in the path the trench was to go which blocked access to the pipe. Another day was required, and of course more $$$$, to jackhammer the rock out. Then the pipe repair guys came out and repaired the pipe. The following day the guys who did the trenching came out and put all the rock and dirt back in.  I was also sent the final bill for all the work. 

I could now do my laundry, take a long hot shower and not worry about flushing the toilets!

And guess what... 2 days later I am walking to the front door and I hear the patter of little feet above me. The walkway to the door has an over hang soffit with lights. I stepped out from underneath it and look, there were no animals on the roof so they had to be IN the soffit. FRACK, now what ??!!!  I looked and could not see an opening but I decided to go upstairs and walk out onto the balcony to see if the roof had lifted and the little beasties go in that way. Well it turn out the side wall of the soffit was not only rotted, it was GONE.  Time to call the repair man. Can we say more $$$$. This will be fixed tomorrow!

Ah, the joy of owning home and now I understand why many older single women rent - you don't have to pay for all of these repairs, your landlord does.

Since I fully retired in 2002, after the BIG Walk, I certainly kept myself very busy doing all the things I wanted or could not do while working full time - sewing, knitting, metal work, spending time with Boots and Erich, go back to school to get the art classes I wanted...  Then I found myself, not wanting to do much anything after I returned from the trip to Arrowmont. I was tired and had things around the house to catch up on but toward the end of that week I just wanted to sit and knit and watch a bit of TV.  It is now two weeks later and I still felt that way but also I felt guilty for not doing some things in the studio that are on my metalsmithing "goals" list.

Yesterday I had a long chat with Elisa of Scotland and I mentioned all of this. We talked about how, with retirement, after a very busy career, it can be hard to accept that one is ALLOWED to take time to relax and not always be busy and doing something. All that time you spent working is now bonus time and does not have to be filled with activity.  POoOF, MIND BLOWN.

I have a week before classes start again at Texas State so I am going use this time to Relax, Knit and just do a wee smidge of metal work. 

I missed writing in June, sorry about that. 
Here's a recap of the month - 

• The grief hit me really hard last month and so I spent a lot of time just sitting, missing Erich and crying.
• Other times I spent on the cleaning/purging/reorganization of Erich workshop which is now done. 
• I went to the Tobin Center to see a lecture by Neil DeGrasse Tyson, my second time, and treated myself to a nice dinner beforehand. I paid extra to attend the after Q&A session; there were some very good questions and of course answers too.
• I took the quilt I made in May to the quilter and got it back; it's now on the couch to snuggle under while watching TV. Then I made another quilt which is now at the quilter. I have been collecting Asian themed fabric for 20 years and I thought that since I need a new quilt for my bed why not use ALL the fabrics. I went with a scrappy pattern called Turning 20 which uses 20 fat quarters but I had not only fat quarters but YARDS so I used fabric from all of it and ended up with a King sized quilt.  See the pictures below 

Now I cleaning my studio which has been sitting idle since the start of the pandemic. It's important this get done NOW - see the news below.  Before and after pictures will be posted when it's done. 

Now for the big news. 
I am now in the Class of 2028 at Texas State University - San Marcos.
I am going back to school to get a Bachelors of Fine Arts (BFA) in Studio Art with an emphasis in Metals.

I investigated this when we moved here, for when I retired, but of course some much has happened over the past year it just got delayed. I started to pursue it at the beginning of the year -I I filled out the application, I wrote 2 of the 3 optional essays, and then had my H.S., B.S., and M.S. transcripts sent in. Then there was a delay because the M.S. transcript never arrived and I had to have it sent again with verification of receipt.  Three weeks later I received the email that I had been accepted (now you can understand why I am getting the studio in order).

I will be a 3/4 part-time student with 3 classes in the Fall/Spring semesters and 2 classes in the Summer so I can still finish in 4 years but have more free time to take care of me, my hobbies, and the house.  

​I start classes at the end of August. 

I have now been at this day job for 6+ months and I am finally feeling like I know what is going on. 

Usually with a new job, where I am writing software, you learn about the project and application the while working. But now, I am not writing code 100% of the time; I am also supervising a team in India plus two other contractors based here in the USA and are also remote. Then there are all the meetings I attend for planning and communications - I am not use to all this and it has taken me time to adjust.

I currently spend most mornings in meetings with a half hour to an hour+  in-between where I can get some "work" done. Then I have lunch and maybe another meeting after that. I have "dark time for Laurie" from either 2 or 3 pm every day where I can take care of my actual coding work. This is not to say that I am not working in all those meetings; it is just a different type of work. 

So what is it I do during my work (dark) time?   I write business requirement documents (BRD's); writing test scripts and testing code; planning for deployments and releases; and actually writing code which is very very little compared to prior jobs. 

On the other side of this, I work a normal 8 - 5 day though some days I work through lunch only because I don't want to stop what I am doing (and I am nibbling my lunch while I do it)

Plus I am not stressed which means I have am not having the pains in my chest like I use to.  Actually I have not had a chest pain in several months (watch, I have just jinked myself) 

I am ready lots of books and really enjoying my new-ish studio and I have even begun, again, teaching some metal classes. 

And come Thanksgiving weekend, I start my countdown to retirement. I may not retire when I hit full retirement age but then I will have more options to work at a day job full time, part time or not at all and spend all my time either on weaving, knitting, quilting, temari, or metals. 

We found a general contractor! He has been calling every few days to give us updates and to make suggestions about changes based upon what he found in the walls.  To say the prior owner built a kludge is an under statement.

Last week, Nathan pulled up the carpeting on the main floor and removed the old kitchen cabinets. These will be reused in my new studio which is phase 3. 

We went to Home Depot to pick out a style of cabinet plus a stain color. We also selected a formica counter top, nickel pulls and knobs, a floor tile and back splash tile. I bought samples of each so we can give them to Nathan as guidance; he is having a local (to the house in Texas) cabinet maker build the cabinets and use a similar stain color. Nathan is also suggesting a granite counter top and other flooring tile.  

The final decisions will be made next week when we take a trip out to the house, yet again, to see all these options in person. 

I have, based upon Nathan's measurements, selected the appliances: Range, Dishwasher, Range Hood, Refrigerator, and the Washer and Dryer, Sink and Faucet. All of this will be bought once the cabinets are ready to install and will be delivered to the house for Nathan and his team to install. 

What else are we doing besides the kitchen? Widening the stairs to the second floor; adding/relocating the laundry room; relocating the pantry; installing new upstairs and downstairs air handlers; finishing the master bathroom as this was not done as part of the purchase; removing a false wall and making the living room bigger; add tile to the fireplace and add a hearth to it, as this was not done too; and lots of little repairs to the walls. 

Once the main house is done, then there are repairs to be done to the outside, the car port widened for too cars, and a nice paint job. This will be phase 2. 

Phase 3 will be my studio.

I was going to take the 1200 sq. foot free standing workshop at the back of the property. We were going to add a 3/4 bathroom and a small water heater to have hot and cold water for a big sink for cleaning of metals, patina, etc. EXCEPT we now found out that the septic tank is UP HILL from the workshop plush we might have to drill through some rock to get to it.  Thus the decision has been made for me to take the 800 square foot bonus room in the house.  This is on the main floor and it right across the hall from the downstairs bathroom; it will be next to the laundry room too which will mean it won't be too expensive to run water pipe to the sink and to drain it into the septic. This will actually be much less money to do.   We need to seal the floors to reduce moisture; add a split system; install the cabinets; lights; tables, chairs and other workbenches. 

Erich - a.ka. "the shop elf" will get the workshop for his weight room and electronics hobby stuff and as general storage since we don't have a garage either. 

Enjoy the some of the before and after demo and a few other odd pictures!

After the trip to Texas Hill Country back in November we put an offer in for a house in Spring Branch and it was accepted and so the inquisition with the mortgage company began. 

The house closed on January 20th and so we flew to to San Antonio and went up to house to meet with our agent and take care of some final tasks.  The house will be rented so we had to go through it to put together a list of things that had to be taken care of before it could be shown. The yard was a bit of a mess with trash that was either from the owners or from kids cutting through the back acreage. Then the interior paint job, despite being new, was really bad; they did a light beige but you could see places where they missed and white was showing through. So the entire interior is being repainted white. There were a few other minor repairs but by next week, we expect the house to be ready for showing. 

Here are some pictures of the house and a bit of the river park in New Braunfels.

I was back in Texas Hill Country this past week. 

We took two days to drive out using Deming, NM as our half way point to spend the night. That was about 700+ miles for each day.


On the way back we pushed to Tucson, Az as our "mid" point. That meant we did 900+ the first day and it was too much. I was loopy and very tired and despite having an easy second day drive I just think 900 miles was too too much.  Although, while at a Texas I-10 rest stop, I was TomTom'd. Their mapping car pulled in soon after I got out of the car. I don't know if I will actually be in a street view picture but either way it was neat-o to see. 

Here are some pictures from the trip