4 Years and Still Going Strong

I can't believe I almost missed our 4 year anniversary (living off grid), it was yesterday and I didn't think about it until late last night, oh well, I have excuses, really I do:

1. Our life, living off grid, we don't pay attention to dates and times, honestly, I have to use email and Google calendar to remind myself about important dates I have to remember, such as doctor appointments for the ladies I take care of...
2. I've never been one to pay attention to dates and times, I just don't play well with numbers... I think it has to do with 3rd grade math class, oh I won't go into that, it's much too boring, but suffice it to say that's when I began to give up on math and anything having to do with numbers. ;p
3. Lastly, I don't have my computer at the moment... I'm using my old laptop and it doesn't have all of my stuff on it anymore... more about that later.

Soooo, it's been officially 4 years now, well 4 years and 1 day to be exact. I love our life and can hardly remember life before this, I'll tell you this, it wasn't nearly as rich as it is now, I'm not talking $$$ rich, I'm talking life rich, before I was working 2 jobs, commuting at least an hour each way, the only outdoor time I spent was the time I took to go from my house to my car and from my car to my jobs. I was surrounded by people but had few friends, and no sense of community...

Now I live on just a hair under 6 acres, on the side of a mountain, in the high desert of far west Texas, in a tiny community of between 150-200 people, I might see only a couple of people a day, or maybe none, but I'm part of this community, mainly through getting to know everyone when I worked at the Country Store, then when I joined our church, I met that many more people and really got involved with the community.

I can hardly go in to town these days without running into at least one person I know, it's usually more like 3 or 4 people, it's funny, on the rare times I'm in town and don't run into anyone I know, I complain about it, I'm so used to having that social contact now, I never had that before, I'll not blame anyone but myself, I chose to keep myself isolated, it was easy to do. When we moved out here, we assumed we would become hermits, but the community wouldn't allow us to do that, they not only opened their arms to welcome us, they pulled us into the activities and other goings on. In fact, my biggest problem is not getting pulled into too many things out here that I don't have enough time to do the things I need to do for myself and PB.

This past week has been so busy that I didn't go to our volunteer fire department's annual Christmas dinner, I hated missing it but I just didn't have the energy to go. I've seen pictures of those who attended and now I wish I had gone, I know it would have been lots of fun, but I can't worry about it now, what's done is done, I'll just hope to be able to plan better next year and try to go no matter how tired I feel at the time.

Oh yeah, my laptop, I finally got it sent off on Wednesday, the fan inside started making a loud noise when it first booted up, this began happening less than a month after getting it, I recognize that sound as a bad fan, one that will be failing soon, it sounded just like the original fans in the inverters I have after they had been in daily use for over 3 years, the laptop fan shouldn't have been in that shape so soon no matter how dusty it is out here. I contacted Toshiba and tried to get them to send the fan out and let me install it, it's just a fan for gosh sakes! Oh they would send me one and I could install it, BUT that would void my warranty, if I had been closer to the end of my warranty, I would have done it, but it's only a couple of months old, so I grudgingly agreed to ship it off. I immediately began feeling withdrawals when I dropped it off at the UPS drop off site on Wednesday, I've been tracking it via UPS, it hasn't even gotten to Toshiba yet, I figure it will be after the first of the year before I get it back.

Well, that's about all for now, oh except for one last thing, PB grabbed the camera the other day and captured a picture of the rare and elusive off grid mountain girl in her natural habitat, it can be very dangerous to get too close, they have been known to attack without provocation or warning, they are very shy and tend to hide whenever anyone comes around with a camera...

This one is surrounded by the necessities within arms reach, one laptop computer (complete with high speed internet connection), pretzels, hot tea (in the pink glass), Kleenex, crochet stuff and stash (in the grey tote), books (including my Bible), reading glasses, a light (low wattage LED light), the piano keyboard in back, and one warm robe. Who needs anything else???

If I don't write anything else before Christmas, I wish everyone a very merry Christmas, and a safe & prosperous New Year!




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Wretha,

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