Jeanne is here

Jeanne arrived this morning. It is great having
her here for a few days. Talking helps and she
and I have always been good at that.

The cleaners are here today. There are 8 of them
and they will be here again on Monday and Tuesday.
They are cleaning the walls, ceilings, floors and
everything in between including all the books. I
never realized how many books we have until you
think of taking them all down and cleaning them
and the shelves upon which they sit. Also, they
are cleaning everything in the pantry. We left
the window open in the pantry so it smells worse
than the rest of the house.

We've had the air scrubbers going for a couple of
days and that has really helped get rid of the
smell. They are very efficient.

I called the Sheriff and the County Commissioners
today to ask if they could at the very least put
up a sign asking people who are just curious to
stay away for another week. The traffic with
Qwest, Xcel and the cleaners is bad enough. Adding
a dozen or so motorcycles and bicycles plus all the
cars filled with the curious causing more traffic
than I have ever seen up here. It is annoying
to say the least.

We are still hoping for rain. The fire danger
is still extreme and that is scary.

A good night's sleep helps!

Finally, I got my hair done today. That is
always a morale builder. Better yet, Robert
and I slept soundly for the first time since
September 5th. It's amazing how much a good
night's sleep helps.

After my hair appointment I went to Michael's
and picked out some artsy stuff for Ariel. They
are going on our annual trip to Gothic to spend
the weekend there with Robyn and Janis. Robert
and I are just not up for that at this time.
I usually spend a lot of time with Ariel while
the grown ups hike and talk...It's hard to be
the only child with 4 adults. Hopefully, when
she gets bored Carl will bring out the package
and it'll keep her content for a while. She
is very creative and has quite a talent for
drawing and making things.

Tomorrow Jeanne comes, early AM. That will be
lovely.

Saturday friends Karl and Gretchen are coming
to help with the outside clean-up. We haven't
seen them in a long time. First, they moved
to Texas and then to New Zealand. I think they
have been back for a year and living near
Cherry Creek, but we just haven't gotten
together. It'll be fun to see them.

One step and at a time

We are safely home. All utilities are
working! That makes it really home. I
hate it with no phone/Internet.

Monday I called Qwest and played the
"elder" card. They hate to think of an
old lady in the mountains without a phone
and I can sound pretty plaintive when I
feel it might work. It did. Two
technicians showed up late afternoon and
said they had orders to get the phone at
204 Gold Run working NOW. They had to
use a different pole and were then going
to lay it on the ground, but Russell objected
so they attached it to a pine tree, above
the old chicken coop, aka garden shed and
then across the ground to our old Satellite
Dish pole and down to the house. What ever
works. They did say it would probably be
months before they installed a new pole
and got it off the ground.

I suggested that, while you're here, couldn't
you get my son's working, too. His line is
still up, but his phone goes from our line
down. They fixed Vernon's line, too. He's
now back in business.

The cleaners have taken away much of the
loose furnishings..pillows, drapes, bed
covers, etc, etc...bags and bags of stuff
to be cleaned. They have also brought in
air scrubbers, which are noisy, but do
seem to be doing the job. The smell is
almost gone.

It rained a little last night which, hopefully,
will lay some of the dust. The smell is worse,
though. Kind of like the difference between
dirty dog and dirty WET dog...ugh.

The Insurance Adjuster showed up today. I
think most of the cleaning will be covered and
some of the rebuilding of the two out buildings.
Of course we were under insured so will have to







Above: back of house; Left, Garden Shed; Below,
Solar Hut





domuch out of pocket...and Robert isn't sure how
much he wants to do. I think we'll rebuild
the horse barn as a place for the VAN. I'm
not sure whether he'll rebuild the Solar Hut.
Time will tell.

Home without the "net" nor phone...

We're in town this evening, briefly to get caught up
on Internet.

We have moved home BUT we have no phone up there. Our
land line is still out and Cell phones don't work. It
is frustrating because our insurance people keep
leaving messages, but of course we don't get them!

Tomorrow we shall come to town and Robert can
call the insurance adjuster and I shall lambast
Qwest. Our neighbors have phones, but our line
was cut by the firemen because the line was hanging
so low over the road. We have reported our
phone outage, but I think they think it is all
fixed. Vernon has no phone either. He didn't
even have power until late in the day today.

Robyn was here over the weekend and she and
Robert made louvres for the case that covers
the electronics for the solar system. The
system is up and running! YES!

I find I'm still pretty shook up over all
this and have discovered that those of us
who are now living up here share the same
lethargy...just can't get moving and the
brain doesn't seem to work the way it
should!

I can't wait for it to snow, a little..not
a lot. Just enough to cover up the black!

I still haven't been able to make myself
go up the back road to see the worst of it.
I have been told that it is all dead up
there. The trees are just black sticks
and everything else is black, too. I
have enough black around the house. I
don't need to see more.

Our house faces the road and all of that
is still green. From our bedroom out
over the patio it is black. The
fire came down to the patio and the
back side of the house. Fortunately,
that side of the house is cement block or
we would have lost the house, too.