Around the Town: Pump goes out in the rain

Loretta's front yard.
Loretta’s front yard.

By Loretta Humble/Around the Town

I’m still embarked on my kid-visiting project, but again this week I found myself back at my own house most of the time. This was the week Carl had scheduled to be gone doing Indian Stuff, so I went home to babysit the animals. As it turned out, Carl was here a lot of the time, too, as he came home to get some tools, spent the night, and then the roads flooded and he couldn’t get back. The rain put a damper on the Indian Stuff which was mostly held out doors, so by the time he could have got back, it was all over.

In the middle of all the rain, the pump quit. So we set pots out to catch rain water. They filled up really quick. Then Carl went out in the pouring rain and banged on the pump and made it start. It would run a while and quit again and he would bang on it again and it would start again. I was glad he was stuck here because I wouldn’t have known where to bang. Now that the rain has stopped temporarily, the pump seems to have stopped permanently. We bought some kind of switch, and as I write this Carl is out there trying to switch it for the old switch. I hope if this doesn’t work the Well Service people can come pretty quick. Luckily we still have our pots of rain water.

A while back I told you that I was turning the space right in front of my house into a dry creek bed. It is not finished, but what we’ve done is really beautiful, with plants growing along the banks. But his week my creek was not dry. Massive amounts of water flowed down it, bringing with it a whole lot of sand which has now covered up part of my beautiful river rocks. Looks like I’m going to have to dam up my creek.

Being away from home for a while has a side advantage of helping me see my clutter with new eyes, and I spent some of my time here dealing with it. I think I’ll be here a few more days while attack my clutter on some other fronts, and figure out what to do about my creek bed.

I had another long complicated story to tell you that involved several members of my family that is pretty funny if I can figure out how to shorten it to fit here. But as usual I waited till the last minute to write my column and before I got this story written, I got the news that my wonderful friend Betty Pogue has just passed away. I’ve written about Betty before, how she was such an inspiration to me, still taking charge of her own life (and sometimes ours!) and having a good time with it as a resident of our nursing home. I really loved that woman. I can’t write anything else funny this week.