Remarkably remarkable.......

9:01 am - Tuesday - June 12th - Southwest Harbor, ME - 61º F, 64% humidity, wind 9 mph out of the southwest.....clear blue skies once again....4 days in a row!  Forecast high for today is 64º F and winds in the 20's.

We are in a stretch of remarkable, beautiful, balmy weather....hence I am remarking.  Regrettably, but somewhat predictably, the weather will once again turn stormy on Wednesday.  That, of course, is what June is all about here in northeastern Maine.  As Scarlett O'Hara oft said...."I'll think about it tomorrow.".....

Monday saw Tony, Alex and moi on duty.  There were ten sites which had departures, so Alex offered to take care of them whilst Tony and I gathered up the campground effluent for transport to the 'transfer' station.  Once all the available trash had been garnered we headed over to the transfer station.  

We were in and out in just minutes and on our way over to Lee's home (Lee is the father of Rain, and one of the owners of SDC) to pick up his mid sized Husqvarna zero steer lawnmower.  We use his lawnmower to cut grass around the cabins as the John Deere is a tad to large for that task.  Then it was into downtown to the local hardware store (McEachern and Hutchins) to pick up some metric bolts for  Todd to finish repairing the John Deere zero steer.

By the time all that had been accomplished it was nearing 10 am......we unloaded the Husqvarna, and Tony took off to cut the grass around the cabins while I headed down to the pool with a box of 2.5" galvanized wood screws to reattach about 25 fence boards which were loose.  11 am came with me about half done with that task....I would not return to finish it for about three hours.  First there was lunch, and then there were the restrooms.  

I did return to the pool area a little after 2 pm to pick up where I left off earlier.  Once I finished that task I headed over to site 117 to finish the repair the picnic table Alex and I had worked on the day prior......we could not find the correct length carriage bolts to attach the new plank to the table portion so we used some that were 3 inches too long to temporarily attach it.  With Todd's help we found the correct ones Monday morning, so now it was time to finish the task, and then repaint the entire table.

It was now 3:15 and I had 45 minutes to go before the end of my shift....I retrieved my favorite Stihl string trimmer and headed down to the cabins to get those areas Tony could not reach with the Husqvarna.  Todd was already down there doing the same thing so I joined forces with him and we knocked out the trimming around the 10 cabins by 4 pm.

TLE had the close shift so she had come on duty at 12 pm, and still had 4 hours to go until the end of her shift.  I gave her a kiss, punched the clock and headed for the barn.....not necessarily in that order.

For the first time in days I did not feel exhausted at the end of my shift.  I went home, changed clothes and sat down in my recliner thinking I would take a nap, but I wasn't tired.....amazing.  Maybe, just maybe, my conditioning has improved enough over the past 5 weeks to where I can see myself thriving at this job over the next 4+ months.  I hadn't written about it previously, but I was getting concerned with how tired I was at the end of each work day.  In retrospect I should not be surprised how out of shape I was......while I was quite active up until December 28th when I had my stroke I was quite inactive since then due to that (stroke), the weather at the Grand Canyon, and the fact that my 5 hour per day job as cashier was not very tasking at all.  I was just way, way out of shape......

Feeling full of energy once again

.....I returned around 7:15 pm to do the pool water tests, close the pool, and do my nightly patrol of the campground.  It was a beautiful evening......

......I was back at the office just after 8 pm to find TLE already turning off the office lights and locking the door.  Time for a couple of days off work, and some more exploring!

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Rain man......

8:49 am - Tuesday - June 5th - Southwest Harbor, ME - 45º F, 92% humidity, wind 7 mph out of the northeast.......raining with heavy cloud cover....forecast high for today is 49º F.

I was back to an 8 am start time on Monday.  As I drove my golf cart down the hill to the office I couldn't help but think about the impending rain due around noon time, and that the forecast showed it raining from noon on Monday until mid morning Tuesday....that's a lot of rain.  This is the kind of weather that makes you hope there is something  to do inside in the afternoon, right?

I hooked up with Tony (he's off Saturday and Sunday) to do site checks, replenish the wood in the 'wood box', and then clean the two sites which were being vacated .  We had all that done by 9:30 am.  Just about that time we saw Alex (the guy with the broken left arm) driving up in his car.  Apparently he had gotten a letter from his orthopedist releasing him to work as long as he doesn't use his left arm.  We gave him a warm greeting and then headed off to mow some grass out near the entrance as well as do some edging with the gas powered Stihl string trimmer.  We finished with that task by 10:15 am and headed back to the office to find out what else we should do before lunch.  Tony joined forces with Alex to show him how to do site check.....we are now doing three per day, and that is something Alex can do with one hand.  

While they were making the rounds of the campground I went back and got the string trimmer to trim some grass in one of the tent sites that had been missed a couple of days prior, as well as some grass around the office area.   This brought us up to 11 am and time for lunch.

TLE has been beginning her work day at noon the past few days and closing the office at 8 pm, so she was still home when I arrived for lunch.  She had cooked me some minestrone soup for lunch....what a perfect lunch meal on a very cold, and soon to be wet day!  Around 11:30 am the rain began to fall, so when I went back to work at noon I put on my new SDC rain parka which Rain has so kindly purchased for me prior to our arrival here in Southwest Harbor.......

....it is completely waterproof and has a hood.  June is a very rainy month and we are finding that out first hand with this first storm of the month.  What you cannot see in this photo is that I am wearing shorts......at least I'll only have wet pants down to my knees.....lol!

Of course, our first job in the afternoon (12 pm to 2 pm) is to clean the restrooms which keeps us indoors, and out of the rain for two hours.  My last job for the day was to go and put to my pool water testing skills learned the day before into practice.  Alex came with me, because yes this is also a job that can be done with one arm.  Alex and I spent the next hour testing and retesting the water and finally had two tests in a row where we got the same results each time.  We have to first determine the chlorine levels in both the kiddie pool and the big pool, and then the PH level in each pool.  These tests determine whether any adjustments need to be made to either.  I think I'm getting the hang of the testing and recording of the results, and the practice was important.  Fortunately we do have an enclosed shed where we can do the testing out of the rain.

By 3 pm I was done for the day, and there would be no need for me to return to close the pool, as we never opened it due to the cold, and eventually wet conditions, so I would be able spend the rest of my day out of the rain.

I took a long, long hot shower which warmed my extremities, and then put on my pajamas and sat down to watch a couple of movies on TV.....'Olympus Has Fallen' (2013, stars Gerard Butler and Morgan Freeman, 6.5 out of 10 stars), and then 'Oblivion' (also released in 2013, starring Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman, 7.0 out of 10 stars).  Then it was on to 'American Pickers' starring Mike Wolfe and Frank Fritz....I love this show and what a better way to spend the end of a rainy afternoon that watching Mike and Frank on their never ending quest for 'rusty gold'.

TLE arrived home by 8:10 pm.....just as I was getting in the VW to drive down to the office to pick her up....I had forgotten she took an umbrella with her to work.  She enjoyed a brief walk home in the rain....it takes about 3 minutes to walk from the office to the Newell.

We were in bed a little after 11 pm drifting off to dreamland to the sound of rain pelting our aluminum roof.......sweet!

Thanks for stopping by!

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