Lol. These people showed up for an overnight stay, they reserved it in advance and had already paid up. I was there when they showed up.  Well, is everything ok? Yes, I replied, y'all are paid up, there aren't any more coming in tonight, you can pick whichever lot you want that's empty.  That apparently threw them for a loop.  I'll assign a lot if the place is full.  I also asked if they needed to use the shower facility or anything? Oh, no, we'll take showers in our trailer. Okee dokee.  

So what are they doing? My phone was blowing up with notifications from the camera.  They are all in there taking showers.  Plus there are 4 ladies in there shooting the breeze.  One of them is doing laundry, I guess the others just want to chit chat? I've never seen so many people in that shed.  

My sign is ready.  But, I need another one that says "Office". Everyone is always asking where the office is?  I don't have an office, but if it's going to make people more comfortable...I've thought about putting a small desk and a chair in there.  Nothing fancy and definitely nothing new.  Cheap, thanks.  Plenty of room for one now that I've cleaned everything up and moved 2/3rd's of the stuff out of there.  

I've got so much to do at the property and so little time to get it done....I really need a helping hand. If I could find someone to actually work.  Side hustle, lots of physical labor but I tend to pay well enough to motivate people. Yet, that doesn't seem to work.  

Well, the oldest boy wants to work tomorrow. Fine.  If parents say he can, we will endeavor to fix the driveway.  I'm glad I got that shed cleaned up today, but that driveway is high priority.  Kept getting shuffled off for other things and then I got sick.  After I get the shed painted and the driveway fixed, it's off to the tilling machine. For days and days, I am guessing.  It's beats your arms up and you can really only do it for 20-30 minutes at a time before you have to stop.  

I will only do the amount of area on any give lot that a pallet full of sod will cover. So,, 40X10.  No, 50X10, I forgot, this guy claims his pallets will cover 500 square feet.  Other distributors say 400.  

Oh, and the tent lady. She was all excited today. Came in the shed to tell me her wonderful news: I got a job!  Well yayyy!  That's great! Congrats! She will be working at the local Tobacco Junction, the most popular tobacco store in this town and the other town where the main store is at.  It's an easy job. Their store in our town is a shed like mine about the same size.  In fact, I think it's exactly the same size.

They get a pretty constant stream of vehicles lined up at their drive thru. Their other store is a huge place with 2 walk-in humidors and a cigar lounge that is available only if you have a membership with them. Anyway, this should pull them out of this tent camping stuff and I feel like I had some small part in helping them.

Oh, forgot to mention.  This happens all the time, people come in, hook up and then...their water heater doesn't work.  They ask if I have a shower? Used to say no. Now I can say yes.  However, it's just a 40 gallon heater, if people are taking long showers, the people after them are not likely going to have a hot shower.  Of course, it's warm outside but you still want a bit of warm in a shower. At least I do unless I'm burning up and I got into the shower so I could cool off.  

 It was an amazing mess.  James had been sanding the walls all over the place and the dust was on everything. It got into the AC as well and the coils are dirty.  I used a vacuum cleaner and got as much out as I could, but it's going to need better than that. 

Anyway. It was near 7 hours to clean that place up.  I had to pick up every single thing, dust or vacuum it off, wipe off, then to the next thing.  Hauled all the left over scrap pieces of drywall to the dumpster.  Got everything where I wanted it and then started scrubbing the floor - by hand. It was far too dirty for the mop to do anything.  I was using a 5 gallon back with water and pine sol, a scrub sponge, a roll of paper towels, a scraper and the vacuum. There was puddles of mud and also some dropping where spray insulation had dropped off the ceiling.

It was painstaking work, but there was no way to start painting in there before cleaning everything up.  I was done around 4:45 this afternoon, I had had enough. Hadn't eaten anything all day long, was hungry, needed to shower and get this grime off of me and take the boys to a church party.  

Oh, I did take several short breaks today.  Phone ringing off the hook, but nothing about people coming to stay at the park.  One call was from a recruiter. Pretty strange.  He asked me if I could access my email while we were on the phone? Yes.  He sent me an application via email, told me to fill it out, send it in and then we can talk.  He wouldn't answer any of my questions. Reading the thing, it said they figure that you are serious after you fill out an application. 

Well excuse me, but I'm not going to all of that trouble without having a few, key questions answered first, thank you and dismissed them. High paying job, likely out on the road for weeks at a time, something they don't tell you in their description.  At most, I will stay out a week at a time. If you can't/won't get me home that often, we aren't a good fit.  

Then there was another one. It's based in Shreveport. Hazmat tanker, lowest tier pay is around 95k per year.  But they list it as OTR, no questioning that, just no dialogue about how often you get home.  

Yet another one. This one is local. I've seen their trucks, they are usually 6 wheelers. They also pay quite well at up to 2 grand per week.  Home every night, it's usually delivering fuels to earth moving equipment, trains, mining operation equipment.  I will be applying there once I get to that point.  They have had ongoing ads for years, they are nationwide but they advertise for local work.  I might also apply at the propane delivery places around here.  It's probably part time work, but who knows.  I need health insurance as well or I really don't want anything to do with it unless the pay is high . 

Yes, I want to try and cash in on hazmat tanker work before going into the other stuff.  Dry vans are a total rat race and really don't like it much. I won't do refers, they are always too noisy.  There is a steel place 2 miles from here hiring, but one of the reviews says it's low pay.  Pilot, Gemini (Love's) and other fuel haulers are all hiring.  But are they training?  Fuel hauling would be local.  Pilot texted me back today asking me where I live? I told them - it's in their map area they have posted - but I heard nothing back.  

Of course, not hearing back right away from a national chain company doesn't really mean anything.  If you haven't figured it out, I'm preparing myself to go back to regular work.  I wouldn't necessarily call what I did today being lazy.  It just doesn't produce a regular paycheck.  Finances are starting to get low, I might have a few people coming in but who knows and I have several empty lots.  It isn't adding up to enough to live off of.  I have bills, like everyone else, responsibilities, like everyone else and I refuse to go bankrupt.

I also abhor this debt relief nonsense now that I found out what it's all about.  You screw the bank, basically. They get back half of what you owe.  Yes, I know, banks are evil, etc etc etc blah.  I'm not a student loan defaulter type person, I'd rather pay back my debts if at all possible. 

Well, I can see how I should just bypass mid afternoons and work mornings and evenings after just having gone and got the boys and then went over to the property to measure for a curtain.  It's low 80's right now versus heat index of over 100 in the middle of the day.  Get more done without burning up.  I dunno if I'll do that, but I have 12 more lots to till.  And then retill. And then rake.  And then lay sod. And then water endlessly.

Oh, the boys. Well, the church had their final summer fun night.  2-1/2 hours of fun. It was pizza, arts, playtime and then?  The church had made a huge piles of white foam that turned out to be shaving cream for the kids to play in. We were wondering why they wanted everyone to bring towels. How much money did they spend on it? I don't know and I have little concern about it.  The church never asks for money.  They have to have rich donors who give them as much as they need, because they are never in want for anything.  The other nice thing is there is always a cop there.  Not likely to be a church shooting at that place with an armed officer sitting out there monitoring everything.  

Well, I'ma get offa here. Look at some more jobs.  I think it was getting that medical card yesterday, it motivated me to get with it.  

The decision was made.  I was to go get this DOT Physical/medical cert. over with - yesterday that is.  

It's funny when you're doing your own for no company they really don't require that much.  In fact, it was laughable.  Eye chart - 20-20 tho I could have read the line below the 20-20 line, blood pressure in acceptable range on the first try, a urine sample.  Not for drugs or alcohol, either.  After the assistant was done, the actual doctor came in, made chit-chat, laughing hilariously about the neighbor calling the police on us doing fireworks - the police never showed up.  

I mean, she was giggling endlessly on that one.  Tickled her feathers apparently.  She listened to my heart for 15 seconds and that was it.  No knee hitting test, no test where they check your strength, there was all kinds of stuff that a company-imposed/required physical didn't include.  Whatever, I don't need all of that stuff, my reflexes are perfectly fine, I have a little arthritis but nothing that stops me from safely performing the duties of a trucker. 

I left there and went straight to the Texas DOT DL office. No waiting, I handed her the documents and my license, she input it into their system, walaah. I'm good for another 2 years, I won't lose my CDL and all is well in the world.  It certainly wasn't time to just let it go.  And I would have been very hesitant to go through all the rigarmoroo I would have had to go through to get the license back.  

_______________

That was yesterday.  After that I went to Walmart for paint supplies, the sign shop to order a sign for the side of the amenities shed - people are confused about that shed and wonder what's in it,  over to Super 1 for a nice, cooked rotisserie chicken (only $6.99 for several meals worth of food) and then home. There was to be no work as I decided it was too soon.

I'm not sure I will work today either. If my head clears up, sure, if not? I am definitely not working with my head swimming around like this.  I'm not looking for excuses not to work, I really want to get out there and get back to getting some of this stuff done.  

So, I am thinking to go over there and get what I can, done. When energy leaves, leave as well, go home and just vegetate.  And nothing terrible energy consuming.  I've tried to find a way to bypass tilling all of that soil for sod and I can't find it. Every site says to till the soil 4 to 6 inches deep even for sod.  And raking it.  

Enough. Time to get with it.