Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Dragon Mood? -- excited, full of anticipation

Happy Wednesday, Happy Wendishday as we say in the family, and ... if you're working ... Happy HUMP day! I'll settle for the first two salutations.

For me, this is a few days of preparation and waiting. We will travel to Madison, Wisconsin, tomorrow night to join Caroline and Ron and friends to build the deck you've been seeing here in earlier posts. Caroline has spent over $1000 in pressure-treated wood, along with 32 bags of ready-mix cement to secure all the posts.

The deck will be L-shaped, the main portion measuring 12' x 20' with a 6' x 10' foot. It will be angled about 15 degrees off of horizontal and stand about 10 feet from the back stoop of her house.

S and I are excited. Well, I know that I'm excited. I think S is kind of exhausted with work, trying to pace herself through the week. Work is automotive-related and as a result, terrifically stressful. She walks in the door and I can see the stress all over her face. It is troubling to me to see her that way. I'm hoping that working with her tools, being outdoors, working with wood will help evaporate some of the stress from her body.

What will I be doing? Anything and everything that I can. Holding the dumb end of a tape, holding framing lumber while it's clamped, schlepping wood from one place to another and my specialty: I mark all the fine cuts for S to make. It takes a good eye and ability to visualize things that are yet-to-be. I imagine that I also may be involved with food prep, meal cleanup and myriad other little details.

The other event that I haven't mentioned is that my son, Josh, hopefully will be joining us for at least a small portion of the weekend ... and bringing a guest, a young lady. I know that her name is Leah, she's an MSU alum, a packaging engineer in the Milwaukee area and someone that I am looking forward to meeting. And I'm looking forward to spending a little time with Josh. He is a very successful actuary who works hard and spends long hours doing his job. He is in the busiest time of his work year, so we'll see him for only a portion of the weekend.

Can you tell I'm excited?

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