MERRY CHRISTMAS

Time is FLYING, we are NOT!  Took the train to CO for Thanksgiving.  Not sure what we might be doing on Christmas - welcoming guests at the Resort, shoveling SNOW (wouldn't that be terrific?!) or perhaps just answering phone calls from family wishing us a Happy Day!  or skiers trying to find a place to stay at the last minute.  We still have ONE two night space in Unit #6, so call if you want two days of skiing at Dodge Ridge, or snow play at Leland HI SIERRA SNOW PLAY!!

Do NOT forget the REASON for the SEASON, GOD put on skin to save us!!  If you don't believe me, read Lee Strobel's "The Case for Christmas" available from a bookseller near YOU!  It would be a great stocking stuffer!  I will be playing the early service at Mount Calvary Lutheran in Sugar Pine on Christmas Eve at 3 PM, may even try for the Methodist Candlelight Service at 7 PM down the hill.  That depends on the weather and the Weatherses who may or may not be here for Christmas!  We have always been a family for serendipity, last minute changes of plans are our forte!

Praise GOD in all seasons and for ALL REASONS!!  Blessings in the New Year - 2015!

THE PIANO

It started on a mild, late August morning with a phone call.  I was being offered a job as an accompanist with the Chorus where I sing alto with a bunch of retired folks who just love to sing!  It was a paying job, and as a “retired” person myself, I could use the extra income, but asked if I could have a day or two to “pray about it!”  The lovely lady said, “Of course.”  My husband said that if I had my piano out of storage so that I could practice, I could take the job!  The light bulb went on over my head and I began rearranging my little Postal Sub-station here in the mile-high hamlet of Strawberry.

My piano is an ancient upright, built in 1865.  It was my eighth Birthday present and has followed us to Southern California, back to Colorado, then to Poughkeepsie NY, and San Jose, CA.  It was here in Strawberry once before, prior to nine years at the parsonage in downtown Sonora.  Unfortunately, our apartment here in Strawberry has a block wall with a couple of tight turns precluding the piano entering our apartment.  Until the job offer I had not considered the section of the building housing our small Post Office.

A couple of days later I received an embarrassed call saying that the job had been taken by the person who was asked before me.  My response was unique to say the least – “Hey, it got my piano on the way to Strawberry, I’m sure that was GOD’s intent! And, I will practice the accompanist parts so if need be I can be a substitute!”

I sent a text to our sons saying that the piano wanted to move to Strawberry; ho-hum responses – bad back, no car trailer as a dead JEEP was occupying that - they had already moved our STUFF three times in a bit over a year.  We measured the piano, and except for four sections of cubbies mounted to the wall in the Post Office - no problem!!   Husband Tom got his saw and took care of removing the excess cubbies.  I mentioned my intention to a neighbor and he suggested that another neighbor with a hauling business might be willing to bring it up on the empty return trip to Strawberry.

Behold, that very night the hauling trailer was full of pine needles and tree limbs ready for a trip to the dumpsite.  A phone call and all was arranged.  The next morning we had the piano as “disassembled” as possible and waiting when the trailer and crew arrived at the Storage Facility.  A few minutes tipping it in and securing it and we were on our way.  My husband quickly removed the Dutch Door upon our arrival in Strawberry, the piano slipped in like it belonged there in the .   building we were living in, in the "office" portion!  I love having it back, now I can “tickle the ivories” and as I quip, “I won’t be “going Postal” since I have on-site STRESS relief!”  What a sense of humor GOD has!!

TIME FLIES!!

What an interesting summer!  A couple of my water aerobics gals and I have been swimming the buoys at Pinecrest Lake a couple of times a week, watching the water levels go down earlier that normal.  Dry year causes "permanent solutions" to be dropped in favor of necessity.  The rule by the Dept of Water Resources that Pinecrest Lake would "stay full" until after Labor Day was re-visited in favor of allowing more water to run down to service the customers in the Sonora Area.  When you "always" enter the Lake at the same point the level is VERY NOTICEABLE - shoulder level becomes armpit, then waist, and when it gets to ankle, you enter the water at a different place!!  The docks are still afloat and the fish are still biting and these two "old gals" can swim to the YACHT tied up at the end of the line of floating buoys next to the sail boats!

The air temperature at 9 AM has been right around 50 degrees and the water is colder than that, but I am not brave enough to take my pool thermometer over to the Lake to check the water temp.  As long as we keep moving until the fingers start tingling, we have enough strength to make it back to our entry point - avoiding a walk on the sweeping asphalt walkway that circles the beach area.

The water company has been able to keep up with the town's water needs by running a diesel pump, getting water from the river coming out of Pinecrest, for 3-4 hours twice a week.  LABOR DAY weekend saw the use skyrocket, even with conservation, so we have - the number of bottles of water brought up from "down below" always amazes me!!  We recycle CRV ONLY, but those water bottles have to have their little caps removed or the recycling center will not take them!!  It may be one of those "is this really worth the effort" jobs, but when combined with the aluminum cans and beer bottles, it equals at least a half tank of gas for the car.  We try to never take recycling as an ONLY trip, but combine with doctor's appointments, grocery store visits, etc.  it works out!

The phone is now ringing for Thanksgiving and Christmas!!  Praise GOD for a good summer despite no swimming pool!!

BUGS

It looks for all the world like a half of a dragon-fly is stuck on my left eyelash!   I have over the past ten years gotten used to "Speck, Shadow, and Fuzzy-wuzzy" the three "floaters" that I acquired in my right eye after a flying leap into Lyons Street.  I tripped on a curb; the shiner, sore wrist, sore hip, and messed up shoulder were additional complications of the ego-crushing incident!  "Oh, yes I am fine!" I told the concerned driver who witnessed the whole thing, "or I will be once I go and get my eyeglasses straightened!"  I also put ice on all the sore places and eventually got an x-ray of the affected hip; got the all new model just last year and it is SUPER!!

So why are "floaters" a blessing of aging.  The optometrist gave me a nice brochure with lots of information and assured me that it was not an effect necessarily of the fall, lots of folks over 50 seem to get these pieces of debris floating in the jelly of their eyeballs!  I have also heard that blood pressure being higher than normal - whatever that is - is NOT a contributing condition. So being a bit on the weird side, I decided that I would NAME them since they were going to be with me for awhile.  Seems a way to address the fears of aging that we all have on occasion, especially upon the acquisition of "floaters!"

So I was getting into the car to go to my Monday Afternoon Chorus rehearsal, and I kept trying to get the eyelash that seemed to have a bug on it.  Then I took off my glasses and cleaned them on my shirt-tail, no luck there!  The BUG was still in my field of vision, complete with legs and one "wing" and a bit that appeared to be a body!  Since this was in a different eye from my three "friends" from ten years ago I was really "bugged!"   So I checked several times for the "floaters" in my right eye - they had totally disappeared!!  AND I DIDN'T EVEN NOTICE!  So much for getting used to having these "complications of aging!"  This one is just going by the name BUG - hope it doesn't take ten years for it to disappear!

WATER, WATER, we need water!

The storm door appears to be open but how much water we get is still a question!  We received about an inch of rain, then one inch of snow twice this last week.  The temperature is in the teens at night, but the lack of moisture is so acute that the small amount that we received was instantly SUCKED UP by the dry ground and dry atmosphere!  This is not NEW; it has happened before!  The time that sticks in my memory is the winter of the MARCH MIRACLE - 1990 / 91 - when it snowed for six weeks non-stop, starting March 1st.  But in the twenty years that we have managed The Rivers Resort in Strawberry CA we have had really dry years at least four times.  We always hope for a late Easter so that the skiers can take advantage of the snow once it finally comes!  AND this year Easter is the Sunday before fishing season starts.  You can't get much later than that!

So the question is - do we plan to FIX the leaks in the bottom of the pool and HOPE that we have enough water to fill it and to "top it off" all summer?  One of the bids that we received from a commercial pool company in the Valley was just under $40,000!  Might be cheaper to have them build a NEW POOL!  The other - lowest bid - was from a concrete concern here in Tuolumne County and he gave us two options $10,000 and $20,000.  He also gave us only two folks we could talk to regarding his past work and neither would return my calls!!  Red flags!!

Wisdom is what is needed - and MORE WATER!  PRAY for SNOW!

HAPPY NEW YEAR and where is WINTER?

"It's raining, it's pouring, the old man is snoring"  So much for the 1 to 3 inches of SNOW...

Any moisture is WELCOME this winter, even rain when we want SNOW!  No skiing yet, minimal ice to slide on at the Snow Play area.  Three cabins of intrepid vacationers to be thankful for this weekend...it would be so nice if weather was predictable and dependable.  I am sure that farmers and ranchers would agree!  The bottled water sales this summer should skyrocket if this drought continues.  If I "played" the Stock Market, I would buy stock in one of the bottled water companies!!

I remember a drought back in the 70s when we lived in San Jose - water rationing.  We could ONLY water the grass on alternate days!  My weedy lawn looked better than ever as I didn't dare miss my day to water.  Of course the Water Company didn't collect as much money since people were using less water, so they "had to raise the rates!"  with the blessing of the PUC of course.  Did the rates go down when the drought disappeared - as droughts always do - not likely?!

So did my rates go down on the cabins here at the RESORT?  YES they DID!!  We are offering a NO SNOW discount - off season rates until Dodge Ridge opens.  ALSO as always a "couples deal" for those cabins willing to give lower rates for just one bedroom use!!

Life is always a cycle - you are born, you grow, you earn, you save, you retire, you die - hopefully before those savings evaporate.  We discovered that the rules for IRAs and the mandatory disbursement of savings has suffered the same "problem" as the water companies in San Jose in an earlier paragraph.  People are living longer, saving less, working longer (but at low paying jobs) so the IRS needs to raise taxes by increasing the percentage of your IRA disbursed each year!  All because they gave you the privilege of saving PRE-taxed income in an IRA to start with, so they can and will decide how much you take out each year to add to your taxable income!!  Sneaky those bureaucrats and Congressmen!!  As I said in another venue - we have to be willing to see cuts made or we will never get out of the financial mess we are in as a nation.  Now if we could just get the CONGRESS on the same page as the rest of us - cut expenses, decrease your salaries, and get the same health care as you dictate for the rest of us!!  Term Limits on ALL levels of government "service" - professional politicians are part of the problem!!

I think I will put my soapbox away, and make some phone calls or knit!