Icing on the Cake

On the way into the Blue Hill Co-Op, there's a sign that says please turn off your cell phone before entering. I'm new to the cell phone and forgot that I had one of those offensive objects in my pocket when I walked in to placate my daughters' need for snacks. It was on. Still, this shouldn't have concerned me; only one person has the number and she, Michelle, has little reason to call. There we were sitting on bar stools in the cafe eating a blueberry muffin and drinking a raspberry seltzer and, much to my surprise, my phone rang. Audibly. Yes, I should have had it on buzz mode, but it's only rung three times since I got it a few weeks ago. Again, to my surprise, it wasn't Michelle; it was Lewis Tapley. I had called him first thing in the morning to complain, again, about his road building incompetence and used the cell for the call because we don't yet have long distance service at the new rental. (That's how he got my number.) One of his guys was there in Sedgwick and says that it doesn't need fixing?!@$#? Really? I was just there yesterday and it was deeply rutted. A joke. I just didn't know what to say. Yelling foul language into the cell phone was simply out of the question under the circumstances. I just told him I'd be right there. Chloe chugged the rest of her seltzer. Hazel finished her muffin on the road. All the way to Sedgwick I was quietly muttering expletives of disbelief. Then turning into Sis Porter Rd I met Jeff, my over-achieving excavator, on his way out in his dump truck with machine in tow. I rolled down my window. You're not going to believe this, I said, Lewis just told me there was nothing wrong with the road. That one of his guys was just here looking at it. Jeff: "I know. I just fixed it. With all the rain we're going to get this week it would have been bad if the road had stayed the way it was." Of course, just yesterday he didn't tell me he was going to do this. We got a good laugh out of this, and I went on to look for myself. I called Lewis back to tell him that he was off the hook. Weasel that he is, he made it clear that he had shown up to do the work. In other words, don't expect to see any money back.

Later in the afternoon, I met Bobby Gray at the site to talk about plumbing. We mapped out a rough course for the near future. He also told me that he would install our solar hot water system at cost since they've never done one before. Our house would become an example for their work.