Establishing our new 'normal' life wonderfully upheld by the prayers of our friends is like the woman who was decluttering and bought a machine to turn her old cassettes into mp3 files. She opened the package with great determination and to her joy it seemed possible. She then discovered she needed a CD drive to download the software (tablets don't have them). Having found an alternative source for the software on the web she worked through the instructions and to her great pride found she had delivered one cassette to safe storage on her computer as a wav file. So she set another one going (somewhat frustrated that this all happens in real time) and went to bed. When she arose the next morning the second recording associated with many hours of background white noise after the tape had finished were awaiting her. Her attempts to reduce the file back to the required 90 minutes deleted it so she still only has one successful wav file. Oh well, deep breath, set it going again.
That is a parable of life in general I guess, but it seems particuarly apt just now. Most things are going along well, but we hit the odd hiccup and frustration where it all seems to be falling apart. I am sure shipping 180 fewer cassettes than I had planned will be a good thing but there are times where effort, planning, and the prayers of our friends are just not quite enough to keep things going in the right direction and the task seems overwhelming! In the parable context 180 x 90 minutes = 135 hours of cassette playing. Paying someone to do it would have cost at least £3000 but I can see the attraction! We don't have many videos we want to keep (but the technical challenge of that one for someone who never really managed the video player is high!) and only two movies - I will find someone to pay to do the movies.
Today had been a day for the garden and I am sure the weather forecast was for sunshine as I look out on the rain ... In the meantime should you come to visit you will hopefully notice progress: Mark's study, the understairs cupboard, the porch, the hallway, the dining room and the living room have been addressed prior to the shipping assessment on Friday and the measuring of the house for sale on Thursday. However, the kitchen and family room look worse as the problem-cases migrate in there!