Very tired tonight. I worked some this morning in the basement, then I cleaned me up and at 3 pm went to see my tax man about my first-ever quarterly NYS sales tax forms and payment.
Since SilkenDrum hasn't sold anything yet (shhhhhh...), there was no tax to pay (had to file the forms anyway), but I had a lot of questions as to what kinds of records to keep and all.
My financial advisor is in the same office, and we all got to talking about the local belly dance scene, and the tax guy mentioned that there is a dancer every Thursday night at a Greek restaurant in New Paltz - so before I knew it, the three of us (plus whoever wants to go along) are going to dinner in New Paltz on a Thursday evening in the second half of July. Takers? Anyone?
Then I put my grungies back on and went back to the basement.
I have a garden cart - bigger and deeper but lighter than a wheelbarrow, two wheels in the middle and one leg under the handle - and I used that to move all the trash from the basement to the trailer, pulling it around the side of the house. You have to lift up on the handle to lift the leg off the ground to push or pull it. It can get heavy. And there's a hill, a one-story difference between the back and front. I dragged that thing up (loaded) and down (unloaded) at least 12 trips. I completely filled the trailer, and it's a BIG trailer.
There's one more load to go, but it's cardboard (a 6-foot stack, cut and flattened, and already in the cart), so I'll wait until morning to take that up, in case it rains overnight. I have to pay by weight at the dump, so there's no point in paying to dump water (soggy cardboard).
I can finally see a difference. I figure we'll have to do this (take trailer loads to the dump) maybe two more times, maybe three, and then I'll be finished. One whole load will be just paper. I've given up any thoughts of recycling. I'd overwhelm the village recycling center with all this. (which doesn't make sense - seems like the more there is, the more important to recycle, but it just doesn't work that way.)
There was a pile next to the basement door of stuff that I had put out last summer. A lot of it was that shape-fitted styrofoam packing. I picked up one piece and threw it into the wagon, and ... wow ... there's a paper wasp nest in it! The small nasty yellow and black guys. I got stung on my right knee, foot, and back of the thigh.
I went into the house and put ammonia on the stings, and it stopped the pain and reaction immediately (one of Jay's tricks - right now I can't even see where I was stung). Then I got into the van and drove to the deli and bought wasp spray, and got my revenge. After that, I flipped stuff with a stick before I picked it up.
I hadn't considered yellowjackets - the worst I'd expected to find in all that junk was maybe a garter snake or two (I saw one baby one) and mice (found a few old nests, but no live mousies).
It was supposed to start raining in the late afternoon, and rain hard into night. While I was at the deli buying the wasp spray, the skies opened, and it rained so hard the raindrops were making 10-inch splashes, but it lasted only a few minutes, then was completely gone. Later, there was a small lazy shower, which I took advantage of to eat dinner.
So, all in all a productive day.
One irony - while I was dragging the garden cart up the hill, I was wishing I had a good old (large) children's play wagon. I'd have gladly made four times as many trips if I could just pull, not have to both lift and pull. Guess what I found as I was making a last pass around the basement before closing up? I saw a familiar-looking style of handle sticking up behind a pile of boxes. Jay's childhood wooden wagon! Not large, but a useful size for smaller stuff.
Grin....
~~Silk
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