DUMPSTER DAY

A triumph, despite lashing rain which poured off the slate roof like Niagara Falls (no gutters), some of the finer accomplishments of my ten busy helpers being:

- Livingroom carpet and underlay chucked

- Odd's office carpet and underlay chucked, floor cleaned and sticky carpet tape crap removed

- Aunt Elise's old hospital bed chucked

- Odd's metal filing cabinet and safe, chucked

- Attic now 98% clear

- old hot water tank brought up from basement and chucked

- furniture/wood/metal pile ready for charity to collect hopefully sometime soon including doors, trunks, mattress springs, paint cans, windows, you name it, plus 5 sets of skis, some which look like the Leif the Lucky brought them over on a longboat when he and his mates discovered Vinland

- sticky black carpet tape marks from entire downstairs removed with 'Goo Gone', my new favorite purchase

- Peg's good Lenox china and 101 Royal Copenhagen Christmas plates wrapped and taken away by Louise the eBay Queen, as well as an entire SUV full of other salable goods.

- Peg family ephemera, photos, letters, books, bibles and vintage household items catalogued and boxed, ready to be photographed today if I get to it. Waiting to hear from curator of Minnesota museum, then rest will go to family scattered around the States (whether they want it or not).

- The Fairbanks museum in Dedham, MA (first frame house in America, a family from whom Peg is descended on her paternal grandmother Lynch's side) has been contacted to see if they want a table that's been in the family for generations and is said to have come over with Jonathan Fairbanke from Sowerby Bridge in Yorkshire in 1643 or thereabouts, but no way to prove this, so if the snooty bastards turn me down I guess I bring it back to England.

- The front stone terrace has been completely excavated now, and Ken the Magnificent is hard at work digging out the rest of the stonewalk that goes around the house, which has also disappeared under five feet of grass and pachysandra. He has finished planting all window boxes with pachysandra and tomorrow he will start looking for the lower garden, which I figure must be down there somewhere, I remember picking from a large snowball bush, for decor, when DK and I got married beneath the pines. He also will finish clearing out the garden shed, which we can just make out a corner of through the undergrowth. I reminded him to check his body for ticks (because I'm sure not doing it).

So. We are going going going. I made a quick run this morning to exchange cars for a few days with the lovely Tory, so have her Saab that has no gas gauge, for awhile. She says to re-set the mileage every time I fill up with gas, and when it gets to 300 start looking for a gas station. Will let you know if this works. Stopped at Sunset House afterwards, unfortunate name for nursing home, to see dear Jeanette Roosevelt (1st wife of FDR's grandson), 95, who was in not too bad shape last Feb when I visited but who is now bent over in a chair, in a hospital gown, on oxygen, drooling, and didn't wake up when I held her hand and talked. Maybe she heard, who knows. Hope so. (Didn't tell her about Peg, or that maybe she'd be seeing her soon). Drove back over October Mt. and sure enough, started to tear up, thinking about Mama, then the gear knob came off in my hand and I was fine again.

Tonight is Staff Dinner, out. Place called Elizabeth's. No credit cards. Have a fistful of cash. Am taking Bonnie, Terri, Dominick, Outside Bob and also Dawn, a former employee, who like Bob, also said "I quit!" at the same time as Peg said "You're fired!". Thought they all deserve a thank you, and a large drink.