What will you do for work?

During the early days of this recession, my husband's construction business was a scary place. We were hit really hard before they even labeled it a recession. Then the work started picking up, not great but we survived. The recession was labeled. The 401k's and IRAs lost money. The mortgage crisis hit. The stock market dipped further. Work was slow and steady like the tortoise in classic children's story.

My husband had to work jobs out of town away from the family. Sometimes the accommodations were nice. Some were not. One job in Georgia, in December, he lived in a log cabin that was not winterized and had no heat. It was a cabin that had seen Sherman march by in the civil war (The cabin was on the wrong side of the river and Sherman decided not to cross for it). It had been unkempt for years before some restoration had taken place. General cleaning was not one of the tasked performed.

We are in the process of selling our house and relocating to our home state which we left nineteen years ago. This is the reason I haven't posted in some time. It would be a hard time in which to get a new job here and we can't move until we sell our house. [Sidebar: Actually we've had one contract and another interested buyer back out because in these tight credit times, they can't qualify for a loan (credit problems).]

My husband has proven his love of his family again, working a job that requires he live like an animal. My husband works with a crew that restores dilapidated old log structures and makes them functional and usually beautiful.

This current job site is six hours from home on a log addition to a grand home. The homeowner chose the hotel in which to house the crew, a hotel owned by his uncle. He told them it was nothing special. He drove the guys to their home away from home.

The initial impression, judging the book by it's cover, was spot on. My husband wondered how such a place could still be operating. The truly scary part is the condition of the room. The toilet hasn't been cleaned in at least weeks. The garbage container still contains the leftovers (beer bottles and other trash) from the previous occupants. One of his coworkers ran to the store to obtain cleaning supplies as he was so concerned about the conditions. While my husband checked the bed for bugs, he's not sure how well he'll sleep tonite. Bugs weren't apparent. Cigarette lighters and more trash were found behind the headboard. Then he check the condition of the mattress, praying for clean sheets. An abandoned mattress lying around in the precivil war era log cabin looked to be in better shape than what he is expected to sleep on tonite.

What would you do? Leave or Stay? Come home with no job to face three hungry teenagers. What will you do for work?

Count your blessings tonight when your head hits a clean safe pillow.

Leann Holland

Bug Hysteria

The Bugs Are Back!

By Leann Holland

Bugs, bugs and more bugs
dominate the TV airways.
We thought we were
the dominate species.
Ignoring the old adage,
bugs will inherit the world.
Have we learned nothing
from elementary science classes?
The circle of Life,
the food chain,
ring any bells?
We’ve spent decades
studying the gaps
created by extinction.
Bugs, bugs and more bugs!
Everyone including me
freaked out by the little buggers.
How now brown cow,
do we protect ourselves?
We’ve lost solutions
handed down
from generation to generation.
The bugs are back!



Being a single income family, we’ve purchase a lot of our items used. The reports by all the major news outlets of the returning bedbugs and super bug Lice has me scratching, quite literally. Just thinking about bugs makes my skin crawl thereby making me itch. What about you? Is itching like yawning, contagious?