Another easy Saturday - for different reasons...

The movie last night was a great diversion, though I didn’t understand most of it. Even more exciting was the entertainment outside: thunder and lightning non-stop with torrential rains! I slept so soundly, had lots of great dreams. I dreamt up some new John Candy skits for SCTV. Sitting at the table I was awestruck by the mountains’ new coat of snow. Even though I had a piece of bread for breakfast, I didn’t go out to work today. Patch still felt awful, but he won’t take ibuprofen, which helped me significantly. Sean stayed in bed, too. I slept and slept, but it gets boring staying in bed. I pitched in with some cleaning, sweeping and the like. This place gets dirty so fast! Considering that we all come back after morning work and afternoon work all dirty and sweaty and considering that this is a mud house, it isn’t surprising. Nothing closes completely, and with seven people living in a house about half the size of one floor of the Columbine House, it is no wonder. And there are usually 12 people eating here. Electricity is pretty stable, but the water sometimes goes out. We use a pit toilet and only shower a couple times a week when we build a fire for hot water. The dogs are pretty good about staying outside, but the cats are always sniffing around. We don’t give them food if we don’t have food leftover after two times of serving it, so they are especially bold about putting their noses into anything left out. I know I am not painting the prettiest picture, but just to help you understand where sickness comes from. This afternoon the healthy ladies got to go to the mountains to pick wild herbs. I am really quite jealous. I would have loved going, but I was deemed not strong enough to take. Instead, I cleaned up the lunch mess, studied, slept a little, aired out my sleeping bag and liner, tried to chill out in the hammock until it got to chilly, and watched “What the Bleep Do We Know?” with the other weaklings on a short stack of mattresses. All things considered, it was pretty comfy. Sean and Myrna are getting a fire going for showers. What a Saturday night! The sun and rain come and go, though around 8 pm now, it is behind the clouds and soon to be behind the mountains. We’d planned to drink wine and listen to music at Vida’s house, and then the bravest would head into town for dancing, but I don’t know what we’ll do now. Cards anyone? Well, no cards, but we had a movie night watching Babel – in English, what a treat! And for dinner, a fried egg and bread. Some comforts are worth it. To Bed now! tori