Trapped like rats

Last night I was walking past the dining room and saw flashing lights and movement in front of the house. My first thought was that it was the police or fire department. I called up to Bob, "What's going on in the front of the house," as I went to peek out the blinds. He said, "Probably the road crew," and I saw that it was -- it was some kind of big truck with a flashing light on top that was driving slowly down the street, and just as I looked out, a man walked up to the front door and hung something on the doorknob.

They had resurfaced one side of the street yesterday, so they were coming back to tell us that they were going to resurface the other side (our side) today, and not to park on the street or drive on it from 8:00 this morning to 6:00 tonight.

I was just glad that I had noticed them; if I hadn't, we wouldn't have known and could theoretically have been trapped! Like rats!

We had gotten a letter earlier in the summer that they were going to be doing the work, and that they would give us advance warning so that we could move our cars out of the neighborhood; I don't really think 9:00 the night before could be considered "advance warning," but oh well.

I normally leave the house around 8:30, but I got going this morning early, and left about 7:55. Bob had already left, and when I walked past his office I saw his cell phone plugged in beside his chair. It was a dilemma -- do I leave it there? Do I take it with me? I couldn't exactly call him to ask. I was thinking, if I knew where he was, I could take it to him, but all I knew was that he was going to the bank, then he said he would probably go to Quik Trip, but I didn't have any confidence that I could find him. I knew he was playing golf in the afternoon.

So I left it there, and drove to work, and it wasn't until later that I realized that it wasn't like the street was quarantined -- he could park off the street and walk to the house.

Which he did, as I found out later when he called at around 11:00 to tell me that they hadn't started working on the street yet! So I coud have slept in. I wonder now if they'll even do anything today; we may have to go through the whole thing again tomorrow. Oh well. Not that big a deal.

It rained on me a little as I was driving to work, so I suppose rain might keep them from being able to do the work.

When I turned on the windshield wipers this morning, I looked up and saw that I have a crack in my windshield! My poor car. I washed the car on Sunday, so I know it wasn't cracked then; I guess it could have been dinged, and then the crack spread with the temperature change . . . All I know is, it's cracked. I need to call the insurance company and find out what to do. It's big enough that I imagine they'll have to replace the whole windshield. I'm not looking forward to that.

As I mentioned before, since I'm in between audio books, Los Lonely Boys are getting me to work in the morning. During the day, if I need to concentrate and there are too many things going on in the office, I put my headphones on. This week I've been listening to Adam Ant's album, Wonderful.

Driving home in the evenings, I don't need quite the level of energy that I need in the mornings, so I tend to listen to something quieter. Lately it's been Lowen & Navarro. Eric Lowen was recently diagnosed with ALS ("Lou Gehrig's Disease"), which he talks about in this article. It's things like this that really put your own problems in perspective.

I'm working on a lot of medical stuff at work now, and one of the guys who's helping me with it came in this morning to get a new article to work on. It happened to be one about rheumatoid arthritis, and we marveled at the pictures of the advanced disease and expressed hope that something like that would never happen to us. I don't think it will, but you never know.

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