There is a Christian mission in Pakistan that helps kids that have nothing.  This man somehow found me and at first I thought he was a scammer.  In fact, I held that belief for some time.  He continued to ask for financial help and I continued to tell him I have no idea whether you are legit or not.

Well, after a few months of this, he started sending truckloads of pictures of his mission, the adults helping running it and all the children.  He took his own pics of destruction caused by Muslims that was in the news yesterday when 2 Christians allegedly destroyed a Quran and they came and basically destroyed this Christian compound/city - whatever you want to call it.  

So, I started sending a few dollars here and there. Doesn't take many US dollars to equal a lot of Pakistan - whatever they call their money.  Today, they pretty much proved beyond any shadow of a doubt who they are and what they are doing.  They had all the kids line up for videos of them holding signs that said "thank you Brother Ben" and another one where they were praying for me and yet another where they had printed out my picture and were having the kids praying for me and my business.

It is not a country that I would pick to go visit on a vacation.  The government claims to support all religious affiliations and has laws against persecuting anyone, but they don't really enforce it. Another friend told me that Pakistan is number 7 on the list of Christianity most persecuted countries in the world.  I don't send often, not in a position to. But, I spent 5 years on the mission field and that never left me.  The things I saw and experienced are not things you forget.  

Anyway,  I guess because I fasted yesterday or because I am still getting fatigued from being sick or just getting old or a combination of all of it, I didn't wake up until 9:00 am.  Now, I did wake up in the middle of the night but I got back to sleep within an hour.  I don't think it's getting old, I was starting to feel good about getting up earlier in the day before I got sick and that just wiped me out.  I intend on continuing with this fast today and possibly tomorrow.  

I was supposed to go over and try to find a propane leak on the RV today, the lady said no, let's do it Thursday when I'm home instead.  If I can't find it, I'll have to pay that guy to come out and see if he can figure it out.  Following the line might be a bit difficult. I did check the connections I could find at first, didn't really think I would find any leaks and I'm wondering if they happen to have the oven dial in the on position and don't know it.  I'm just glad it wasn't slated for today.

It's been so long since we've had any measurable amount of rain here, we are now under a red flag warning for today.  It simply means the conditions are ripe for fires.  Lower humidity, high heat, 15 mph winds, they expect that if a fire does break out, it will spread quickly.  It just means to now throw cigarette butts out the window and being careless and reckless with any type of outdoor fire stuff such as grills.  No campfires, no wood burning, nothing. We have been under that for a week now anyway.  

Well will you look at that. Some people called me late a few days ago, said they had made a reservation but were coming in very late.  My site says to call if you are reserving for same day and after hours.  It's simply to ensure that there actually is a space available and give instructions.  They gave me 5 stars.  It's still only 6 Google reviews but it's better than nothing. Every review counts when you don't have many to start with.  I keep getting companies asking me to pay them for them to load my google up with reviews.  This stuff comes out of the blue into my business email account.  

It is unethical and against Google policy to pay for reviews and upon research, it's actually illegal.  FTC can and sometimes will hit businesses with fines, sometimes huge fines, for doing so.  It's why I don't have that many reviews. I can legally ask customers that have used my services for reviews, but many of them won't do it.  I stopped asking because it was a waste of time.  If someone feels inclined to leave a review, then great.  If they don't, nothing I can do about it.  It just takes time to get enough reviews to have a good collection of them.  Most people simply don't and won't leave reviews, end of story.  

I'm so out of it.  I don't recall fasting hitting me this bad in the past.  

I'm seriously dreading this next electric bill.  I don't have it yet, but it's going to be in the 2 grand range.  Those AC systems are running all day long without shutting off. Compressors only start cycling on and off at night.  I stand there and listen to some of them during the heat of the day and even with 2 ac units on many of the trailers, those compressors are not shutting off.  

This is one of those learning moments. Where you say to yourself, self?  You will start putting money aside during the cooler months when the electric bills are much lower to help offset the high bills for 3 or 4 months during the summer.  I knew I would have high bills, I sort of even expected last month's bill but these 2 bills that will show up sooner or later? Just no.  

....well wait no more.  The bills came in today.  Combined they are $2,400 and change.  If you spread that out to all of the units, that's about $150 per month.  My initial research long ago had it pegged around $130 per month.  So I wasn't that far off and it's been quite - excessively - hot.  It appears that it will be well into next month before any real, significant reduction in the heat so I expect at least one more month of high electric bills before they start to come back down.  Some weather would help us about now. Or even just cloud cover.  We've mostly had brilliant blue skies for quite a while now.  Any cloud cover is a welcome site for removing the direct sunlight beating down on those RV's reduces the load on the AC units significantly.  

It has gotten so bad here that people are starting prayer chains for rain.  Amazingly, my little creek still has a trickle of water going through it. I mean, a very small trickle of water.  I would have thought it would have dried up by now.  

Anyway and fortunately, I have 19 days to plan how to pay for this and everything else.  I will wait until I see whether the 3 guys are staying or leaving.  The company usually sends a check within 1 or 2 days before the end of the month. 

Well. No use fretting over electric bills. It is what it is and what happens will happen.

As for now, I'm going to go over there and get some stuff done before the worst of the heat hits us. 

G'day