Between being sick and struggling with bills because the only vehicle we have broke down for almost a week, I've not gotten much done.
I know the two issues don't seem like much, but the cost of getting the part for the truck was well over $200.00. Fortunately, my brother is a fairly good auto mechanic, and was a big help explaining what we had to do to replace the part. It only took me and a friend two days to do the work. :P But the money, that hit us hard. My sister put in a lot of extra hours at work to help make up the difference - which meant I have been watching her kids a lot more than usual - and the utilities had to be juggled too, but we've made it through.
Being sick sucks. Dunno if I've mentioned that before. I'm just getting over some kind of spring flu (soar throat, fever, light body aches). It kept me in bed for three days.
Now, on top of it all, I'm having problems with the router Verizon furnished for my internet connection. I've concluded the problem is with the router because it shows it's not connected to the internet one second, and then it's connected again the next. This has been going on for over a week and everything else I've tried has eliminated the possibility of it being the phone jack it's plugged into or my computer. What cinched it for me tonight was when I went to reset the box (turn it off, unplug the connection to the phone box, wait a min, reconnect the phone cord, turn it back on) I found the box it had been sitting on was wet. The problem is, the phone cord can't be more than 6 feet long (according to Verizon). So, that keeps it near a window on the south side of the house which is cracked open so an antennae cable can feed the TV. We don't have any form of cable TV, just the converter box for digital transmissions. The router sat on a small box on the seat of the window - possibly close enough to the quarter-inch crack to get moist if not wet. I didn't think the rain we've had recently would affect the router, but I can't find any other reason for the problem. I hung the box on the wall via the slots on the bottom of the box and for the most part, that seems to help, but occasionally the connection drops again. I may be looking at having to ask Verizon to send us another box, and with me being a month behind on the payments (I only got about $90 last month from donations), I'm not sure what they'll say.
On the good side, I've finished ch 28 (been through the editors' screening and all) and am about half-way through ch 29. 28 isn't much of a chapter on it's own, so I'll wait until 29 has been edited and post them together.
Just thought I'd offer an update since it's been so ling since I posted last. :(
TD