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| Photo copyright Aji, 2020; all rights reserved. |
Now matter how terrible things are, Wings still thinks to bring me flowers.
The dogs are still missing, and he spent an hour or two this morning on and off the ATV in the extended fields and way back in the chamisa and sage and piñon where it meets the backcountry. There's literally no trace of them. What there was, of course, was plenty of the aforementioned sage, and June is when my favorite, Indian paintbrush, is in full crimson flower, so while he was back there he picked a bouquet of both for me. They're on top of the small stove (now not in use, because it was something like 86 today), and the whole house smells wonderful.
But the dogs. We're pretty well satisfied now that it wasn't a question of them getting hit or shot. There would be some trace, and there's literally nothing anywhere. We think, and the folks at the various likely drop-offs agree, that someone grabbed them. Which would explain what otherwise made no sense, the fact that Cricket was still here — because no one can get near Cricket.
Anyway, everything's late tonight because we had to go shell out for a printer to print up color flyers (our old one, quite old and heavily used now, long ago quit printing anything but black and white and a sort of sickly yellow, and it's the printer, not the ink cartridges). Anyway, then I had to get the printer set up, which was good for a couple hours' worth of frustration, then get a bunch printed, then take them out and get them posted and distributed. And we learned from folks at various places where we left them that there is apparently a rash of dogs going missing now, all over the area.
Wings suggested that someone thought it would be a good way to bring in big money during the pandemic shutdown: lots of VERY rich white transplants in this town, who would probably pay a lot to get their pets back. At any rate, nonwhite and nonrich as we are, we'll gladly ransom them. We just hope we're right, because that would mean they're still alive and likely mostly well and safe (apart from that whole stolen-from-their-pack thing, I mean).
Please send whatever good vibes you have for their safe return. We cannot lose them both at once like this.
And I'm so late now that everything is cut-and-paste, but it's also urgent. We thought 2019 was trash; 2020 is flatly apocalyptic, and it has the potential to get very much worse for us if we can't get this well drilled. So here's all the rest:
I have to shell out for first quarter taxes on Wednesday when my Patreon clears [no, I have not done this yet; I haven't had time to sit down until now, much less do anything else, and I don't even know whether it's cleared yet], have to come up with enough for all the other bills for the month, and have to come up with another quarterly tax payment by this time next month.
I also have to figure out how to fund the drilling of a new well in August, to the tune of $15K, probably, before we're done with it all, and I need to be able to pay for it before then to reserve a spot (because August is the first opening they have, and there's only one guy doing it here now).
I don't know what to do.
I've got to make sales, I've got to bring in the scratch, and I can't do it without buyers. I can't create money out of nothing. I can squeeze that stone until the world ends, and the only blood I'll get out of it will be from the damage to my hands. We're looking at no return to anything like a normal rate of sales for at least a year, probably more, and I don't know how at this point.
So please. The links are here:
Note: At this point, it's getting to be impossible for us to get some of the things we need without using Amazon. We haven't done so yet, but I suspect we're going to be stuck very soon. There are two new items on it that, with these rains, we now need desperately: both for mosquito control, because we know the mosquitoes in this state carry West Nile, and we've already lost one family member to that disease. Those are URGENT. If you can find any of the items on wishlist elsewhere, we'd prefer you purchase there instead of with Amazon (there's even a wishlist function where you can note that it's been purchased somewhere else), but I we realize that they've managed to make themselves essentially indispensable, especially for rural/rez folks like us who are isolated at the best of times. And these are most surely not the best of times.
Please share everything. Thanks.
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2020; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
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