Sink stuff under way elsewhere. Exterior finish work coming up within the next week, with a lot more expense. Sales/shares (registries included) badly needed.

Photo copyright Aji, 2016; all rights reserved.

So Tony called bright and early this morning, already at it in his workshop and needing info on the details of the sink. I may actually have a working sink and dishwasher and small countertop area in here by sometime next week. Or not, but I can dream. I hope I have a working range soon, at least; this business of going back into the toxic tin can to cook is on my last nerve.

That photo is actually from yesterday, just because I like the way it came out; that was at the end of the day, when the clouds were clearing to the southwest, even though they were still heavy and dark in the east. Clearing didn't help much with the cold by then, although today it got up around sixty again, so my joints are screaming at me. It's one thing to have it get cold and stay cold; it's another to have the highs swing almost 20 degrees apart one day apart. The winds aren't helping, either. Raven's like me — he hates the wind — and he spent most of the day indoors with me. Well, actually, I think he spent a lot more time indoors than I did. And this day had both Wings and me running flat out pretty much the whole time, and we're both wiped out. I got really chilled this evening, but the shower warmed me through again, although I did, once again, catch myself trying to hurry my way through washing my hair. When your hair is nearly three feet long, and you have approximately three minutes of hot water for shampoo, conditioner, and shower? Seven years of that gets ingrained way too deeply.

Tomorrow will be a process of waiting for news on the range adapter, putting together a couple of the furnishings that arrived today, and waiting for additional deliveries. The house is taking shape, slowly but surely. If the wind dies down, Floyd will spray-treat the deck by the end of this week, I hope, and Sherm may wind up able to do the final exterior coat next week. He's picking up the stucco this week (the color mix), and I'll need to get the primer and paint for the wood trim, so that's more materials costs in addition to the labor. It's endless. Well, for now. Very soon, there will be an end point for the vast majority of it, and no one will be more thankful than I that I can reduce the number of these posts.

For now, though, there's that "nowhere near done" part, combined with the now "less than three weeks" part and the "winter weather" part. I've had to do some creative shuffling, and now in addition to next week's labor costs, I have to bring in some more scratch before then to cover materials, too. Sales are going to be crucial to finishing this over the next few weeks, but we won't turn away donations, either. We need funds for materials, for increasing the crew's hours (and potentially adding a man, if it comes to that). But the registries have suddenly also become particularly important. The most immediate needs are listed first, and the priorities are the lamps. We have overhead lighting, but indirect lighting for purposes of reading and writing and frankly just not having the glare on all the time are the issue, so the lamps it is. The next big thing will be my office space, and yes, I really, REALLY want (and need) to get that done ASAP, but that stuff is pricier, and for now, I just want to finish off the downstairs as much as possible so that when folks are here in three weeks, it's comfortable for them. And another shout-out to the generous soul who took three other items off the list overnight; I'm told that all three have already shipped. And as always, all of them can be crowdfunded, so kicking in $10 or $20 on an item is extraordinarily useful; a few donations that size to a single item, and it's fulfilled and on its way. All of this, of course, means that we still need shares, daily. So here are all the links:

• Wings's direct PayPal link;
• Wings's site, for sales;
• Lowe's cards (the physical version) via our Amazon wishlist;
• Lowe's e-cards (delivered via e-mail) here; and
• Home Depot cards via the company site. The e-version using my e-mail address is great; I take the tablet to the store with me, and they scan it off the screen.
• Our Amazon wishlist generally.
• Wayfair gift cards, to replenish all the furnishings that the RV has destroyed in one way or another.
• Partial registry #1, from Bed, Bath and Beyond. It's not complete; what's left on it now are doormats and a few other miscellaneous items, although there are more that need to be added.
• Partial registry #2, from Wayfair. Also not complete, but I've finally added a bunch of items to it, mostly now furniture items. But about Wayfair, and VERY IMPORTANT: They make it possible to crowdfund each item. So if you'd like to help, but the prices are too much for one person? You can kick in 20 bucks, or ten, or five, on any one item; many small donations can add up to one item. Even the backordered/out-of-stock items can be crowdfunded in advance. Right now, the most pressing items are the ones outlined above. I've just added the furnishings for the rest of the upstairs (i.e., the guest room and my writing/office space, which also includes the desk and chair further down the list, and the last three rugs on the list, two of which are back-ordered). The chaise and daybed are for the two upstairs rooms: the latter for the guest room, the former for my office, which is where I will be spending most of my time, and my AI issues require working on a laptop with my legs outstretched, so that's why it's a pricier piece; it'll probably be the primary means to my role in our living. There will also be more items that fall into the badly-needed category (lamps, particularly, right now), because the wiring and mold and lime and everything else in this toxic tin can has destroyed so much of what we used to have. I'm sickened by the amount of stuff we have to throw out (on top of the things that were simply ruined, such as the microwave fried by the wiring in that place).

Thank you all, once again, for everything you've done over the last 16 months to get us safe and keep me sane. We are both so thankful for each and every one of you who made it possible for us to sleep (and shower!) now, for the first time in seven years, in a safe and healthy (and warm!) place. I'm going to be mostly unavailable for very nearly anything for almost three weeks now, and it's all complicated by the cold weather and seven years of breathing toxic air. As I said the other night, I will miss everything under the sun, I will forget things, I will screw up things thought to be un-screw-up-able. That's just life with autoimmune disease anyway, and now it's severely exacerbated by all the rest of it. But we have a long way to go, and an absurd amount that needs to get done in three weeks, so please bear with me a while longer. It was unseasonably warm today, but the cold outside now at night is a reminder that we have to get this done, and fast.

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2017; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.