May 16, 2005

Howzit Goin

this is a test. I am posting a photo via Hello from my new laptop. Still have a lot to learn about this. I hope that I am more sucessful at learning this tool than I was with the phone.

The photo is the view of our new house from the entryway. The fireplace is the first thing that catches your eye. We both fell in love at first sight I think. It is fully gas running off a large propane tank in the back, that also fuels a line to a outside deck for a bar-b-que. No more changing tanks. The Neighbors say that Mr. D ran the fireplace and the heatpump, (new) full blast all winter as they are always cold, average temp in the house was a sweaty 80 plus. All felt we could pick one or the other and be warm enough. God knows Woody and I have enough insulation already built on by a steady diet of plate lunch, that we dont feel the cold like a lot of skinny folks.

We spent much of the weekend driving the car around trying to get our bearings. Its very pretty here, everywhere you look, flowers are blooming along the highway, its green. Animals have babies that are sweet to look at. Woody likes cows so we stop along the road to look at them. City boy...

I feel really good about being here. Maybe I have stated this before but it is odd how we just slid into life here. When we moved to the Big Island, it wasnt like this. We also had a rather long wait to get into our home. This was a few weeks after 9-11. The incedent slowed shipments to the islands slowing down the construction of the Sellers new home, and we were staying in Waikoloa, in a resort that is not the nicest, and it was very hot, dry and nasty, like living in the desert. People pay millions to live there and I just cant see it... Why????

Anyway, that sense of being adrift never went away. I dont feel like that now, but more like we have a list of things to get done, and know that we will see the end of this. I think not having the emotions of 9-11 to deal with, and the situation with my Mom, who went through this whole..."I have been abandoned by my children thing..." which was silly as my brother, her favorite, was living next door. I was to one with the guilt trip. Today I have a interesting problem as I dont have a way to call her. The phone in the condo is wired for very local calls only (we cant call anyone down the hill either, unless they have a 800 line)and my cel phone doesnt work here. This is more "back of beyond" than the Big Island, but much more civilized, with beautiful areas and the wonder of wonders a Super Walmart just down the road in BERRYVILLE. We are still getting over how huge these bastons of overabundance are...Still its sort of a relief to not be able to call, as its basically one way conversation and so akward with not being there. So I put a new postcard in the mail every few days and feel that this is about the same.

I hope to get to the place where this doesnt bother me.

Its been really great to read all of your blogs and get caught up on all of the news. Even the old IBM PC here in the room was too slow to load a lot of the sites, so having this new system has been wonderful. It has a lot of nice features that I missed in the computers that I was having to use along the journey not that I am not greatful for all of those public koisks in Hawaii, and the blocked pcs in the timeshares. I could also post with my phone but never was in a place where I had enough signal strength to do this. Even now I am working off a wireless network that I dont quite understand how I am doing this without any service that I am paying for. I need to do a bit of research.