Well, it's been a mostly uneventful week, but a productive one.

We got the pool opened and going, it's been nice on these h-o-t days.

Been working in the garden, which is going along well, despite the heat and lack of rain.
We're just about to have a slew of tomaters come ripe. I'll be busy canning these maybe tomorrow or Friday. I can't wait.
I really enjoy canning because it takes me back to the summer days of my kidhood and working the garden and doing canning with my G'mothers.

No pic, but yesterday J and the boys got some more work done on the new workshop they are building.  They got the posts up for hanging the doors, and about half the siding put up. Doesn't sound like much, but they had to dig holes for the posts, and get them level/square, then concrete them in.
Every bit is progress.

And I got back to work cleaning out that storage room upstairs again. I did real good for awhile, and have it about 3/4's of the way cleared out now.
I'm running into a couple of problems just now;
1) I've been dividing the stuff into two parts: stuff I want to keep, and stuff to yard sale. I have been doing pretty good letting go of stuff so far, so my yard sale pile is as least as big as my keeper pile. Problem being, both these piles are still in the house, and I didn't have room for any of it to start with - hence why that room became a storage room to start with. I am running out of room for sorting the rest of it out.
and 2) I'm getting back to somemore stuff I call, "I don't want to keep it, but I can't get rid of it". My Grandmother's square dancing dresses that she sewed herself.  I don't square dance, and even if I did I don't wear the same size she did. I don't know anyone in the family or even that I just like well enough to give the dresses to. But how can I just get rid of them? I can't :-(

Update on the VFD Drama:

Last Thursday night was station meeting night. R started classes that night so couldn't make it.
The Assistant Chief - the one that had just spent several months training them for the NPQ FF-1 test - called R to ask if he was going to be there, because he knew they were going to try to get rid of him.

R had his gear packed and ready to turn back in to them because, if they got rid of the AC based on the Mileage by-law, then they would also have to get rid of at least 4 other guys who also don't live in this area. That would leave That Guy (who we can call Captain or Asshole, or both) and only 2 Active members.
(Found out they have a whole lot of members of the fire dept - on paper. All the City cops are listed as being volunteer firefighters, a City Councilman, some other old dudes that live in the neighborhood, and a bunch of women R's never even seen are listed as Support personnel.)
Anyway, if they got rid of all those guys, R wasn't staying either.

Check this out: They decided to enforce the mileage rule, BUT they amended it to a distance that included those other four guys, and ONLY left out the Assistant Chief.  The one that had just spent several months training guys for the NPQ FF-1 testing; who got this dept several actual, certified firefighters, for free. (Sorry for repeating, but it still just blows my mind that the Heads of this town are so stupid they'll get rid of such an asset, in favor of such an idiot.)

I know people can be conniving, backstabbing, lowdown FH's. But to be so absolutely blatant about it!

R's friend called and told him what had happened, and R was still ready to turn in his stuff, but the guy said well they were going to stay and vote Captain Asshole out. (Which isn't going to happen - it won't be allowed. It's been tried, and he went crying to the Mayor and she *made* the Chief at the time allow him to stay.)
Anyway, R isn't formally resigning just yet, but is just biding his time until he finishes this summer semester of college.
He got up at 5:15am Monday morning to run a call (he was the only one to show up. Captain Asshole, who lives two doors from the station if we're going to make a big deal about distance being an issue, had to be called and woke up out of bed to respond later on), but other than that he's not really participating anymore. He didn't go to the meeting last night because he was doing homework, and he's not participating in a parade on Saturday for our Hometown festival thing. (Saturday is his 21st birthday, and he has plans with his Dad.)

He told Captain Asshole he wasn't going to be able to make the meetings because he has class on Thursday nights, so Cap decides right there - he apparently doesn't need prior approval from the police chief or mayor - that they'll change the meeting night to Tuesday.

He is large and in charge and eating it up, and it totally pizzes me off.  I was mad and made a smart-allick comment about the situation on a local message board, mostly just blowing off steam. I didn't go into details, basically I said they were a bunch of idiots. (I knew a local newspaper journalist is a member of the same MB, but she didn't ask me any details about what I was talking about, and all the others basically just agreed with me.)
Next thing I know R asks me if I saw the newspaper? The article reported that the Fire Chief had resigned.

Apparently, rather than asking me what I was talking about, the reporter emailed the Police Chief asking him what was going on.
He responded with a bunch of BS, saying the Chief had given notice 3 weeks ago, blah blah blah, and that only one firefighter had left "for personal reasons", and that he lived outside the county.

Oh man, reading that really flicked my Bic!
So I went back and posted, in detail, EXACTLY what had happened and went on.
And told them that Police Chief is a straight up liar, saying the AC had left for personal reasons - they kicked him out, plain and simple!  And not only that, but they had changed the rules so that the other four firefighters that live outside the county could stay.
Straight-up small-town kiss-my-ass BS!

So, knowing how small-town BS goes, if I disppear for a long time, feel free to send me letters in jail.