Finishing up with Habitat

Wed. Feb. 3—Sat. Feb. 5: Marv ended up going back to the building site both Wed. and Thu. He enjoyed working with Ray and Chip, two men we met earlier in the week, and he ate lunch out with them both days. They continued to work mostly outdoors in intermittent showers and mid-thirties Thursday and steady mist-to-rain and 35° on Friday. Somehow everyone agreed that Friday felt much colder and more miserable. Each morning Marv dropped me at the Habitat Re-Store, where Peggy Roberts and Paul Chapman graciously found odd jobs for me to do. Gradually they trained me to answer the phone and use the paging system to get help with loading and unloading and so the second day went faster than the first. I hadn’t taken a lunch on Wednesday so I got by on a chocolate chip cookie and some crackers in the break room. I made sure I had a lunch the next day! Being indoors definitely helped the bronchitis and I seem to finally be on the mend. Good thing, since I finished the Augmenten prescription on Wednesday. The temperature for these three days was amazingly consistent, varying only between about 34° and 37°. There was a lot of freezing rain just to the north of us during this time so we were grateful for the moderating influence of the lake. Although we were tired and cold we went to the nearby movie theater so we could see “The King’s Speech” with Colin Firth, which was terrific! We grabbed a quick, late dinner at Wendy’s and called Sarah, only to find out that Analyn’s oxygen levels weren’t staying high enough for them to send her home. Sarah sounded discouraged but accepted that they didn’t want to take her home and then have to return to the hospital, but we were pretty depressed by the news. It didn’t rain all night. As we drove back to the building site for our last day, the skies began to clear and by noon it was completely sunny with no clouds. But it was still only 32° when we arrived. We worked together to put the last regular piece of siding up on one side of the house and then ran the channel along that side below the fascia so we could put the final run of siding that has to be cut to fit and crimped to snap into the channel. It was challenging and pretty cold (we were working “on the dark side of the moon” as another volunteer put it) but it felt good to get it accomplished. We finished right at lunchtime and went with Chip and Ray to the Abita Springs Café, where we were regaled by the owner on the subject of football and recruiting. We all had their big, yummy hamburger and then returned to the house. It is amazing how much warmer sun and 47° felt by then!! Marv and I put up a piece of plywood in a closet to wall off the furnace and then rehung all the lattice work that goes around the apron of the house. By then everyone was cleaning up the site and we left for the last time about 2:30. Back at the campground we signed up to stay here Sunday night so we can really enjoy tomorrow, when it is supposed to be sunny and low sixties. We relaxed a bit and walked around on some roads we hadn’t explored on our bikes. We warmed up some of the chicken from the other day and cooked a sweet potato and had a relaxing evening.