My Mind's Been in the Gutter

Yes, it's true. My mind has been in the gutter. For a very long time, if you must know the truth. You might be surprised to know that I have a gutter mind. (The fact that I have any mind at all comes to a complete surprise to me.)  


What does having my mind in the gutter have to do with my previous absence, you ask? Well, I'll tell you. It's quite fascinating, really. If you are not on the edge of your seat in anticipation yet, you soon will be, I'm sure.


But first, a little background information:
Hubby and I used to have a gutter business. You know, rain gutters? On houses? We sold our business in 2008 and moved to North Carolina, hoping to semi-retire, because we are getting old, and it's not that fun climbing ladders all day. You remember 2008, I'm sure. Banking crisis, housing crisis, unemployment crisis, to name a few. It was a bad, bad year. Not the best time to be making a transition. At the end of the year, we found ourselves selling our house (sniff, sniff, wipe a tear) and moving back to Ohio - in the middle of winter - %$#$%!!!!  


Hubby and I started doing work for family members, which consisted of remodeling projects and painting. Lots and lots of painting. Hubby has a BIL with a garage door business, and a brother with a gutter business, who both needed an extra hand, so he found himself working with them on a weekly basis, traveling back and forth. 


So, fast forward to the past two weeks. Brother was going on vacation, and Hubby said he would work while he was gone. He also said he would take Wifey with him to "keep me company". "Keep me company" are code words for "help me hang gutters."  Yes. That is what I have been doing. Hanging gutters. 


Now, if you will remember back three weeks ago, we (and maybe you) were having that horrible hot, humid, muggy, hot, %$#@ hot weather! We were working in an area that had been hit hard with a terrible hail storm. Every street, it seemed, had several work crews, working like crazy. New roofs, new siding, new gutters. It was actually quite comforting seeing all the work going on. I started to think that things in America were turning around. But, then I remembered that this was all insurance work. But, still, it's giving some people the opportunity to make some money. 


Anyway, how hot was it? It was so hot that I grabbed a dirty rag out of the truck, dunked it in ice water, and put it on my head. And, I left it there. It looked ridiculous, but I didn't care. At the end of each day, we checked into our economical hotel room, cranked the a/c as low as it would go, hit the showers, then wondered if we had enough energy to go get some supper. (We did) When we returned from supper, we wondered if it was too early to go to bed. It wasn't. We were pooped-out. That was our schedule for two weeks.


So, I do have a few pictures for your enjoyment. And, to prove my story. Honestly, Hubby did most of the work. My main jobs were: Go-fer, and cutting up the old gutter, I also climbed the ladders when we had long pieces to hang. You would be amazed at how heavy a long, thin piece of gutter is, especially if you have to hold it over your head. Yeah, fun times.

The Gutter Machine

Running out a 50' piece of gutter

Drilling out the drain hole - Hubby is already starting to sweat

Caulking the endcaps and drain hole.
(This was before the rag on my head! Sorry, no photos of that lovely sight.)

Getting the ladders set

Hubby working and sweating

 The joys of working around wires

I made a special trip up the ladder for this photo, hope you appreciate it!
The second time up, I was holding the gutter.

Hubby setting the gutter

A word to the wise: If you are getting a new roof, do not assume
that your gutters will be clean when the roofers leave!!!

A torturous sight!!!

Yes, we did drag ourselves out for supper.

So, that is why I wasn't blogging. Too tired!

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Q is for Queen!

I've always wanted to be Queen. Not for the power. Not because of the queenly duties. No. I always wanted to be Queen for very simple reasons. Reason 1- The idea of having people waiting on me hand and foot; taking care of my every need is very appealing. Reason 2 - The Queen gets to wear very beautiful clothes, and she has a lot of them!  Reason 3 - Who wouldn't want to wear a crown? Reason 4 - The castle! Does this make me sound shallow? Well, I am what I am!


I have actually been a Queen. It's true! Unfortunately, the experience was not what I had dreamed about. I had the title, but none of the perks.


This is how I became Queen.


When Hubby and I first got married, he was employed by a local company. After working there for 13 years, he decided to become self-employed. The business he decided to go into was the gutter business. Rain gutters. We thought about using the slogan "Our minds are in the gutters", but decided against it. I never gave much thought about gutters, and was concerned about whether or not there was a market for gutters. (I soon discovered that, yes, there was!)


When you go into business, it's very important to choose a good name. We thought and thought. Hubby's brother was also in the gutter business in another town. He's called The Gutterman. They have always had a friendly competition, and so we decided that our name had to out-do his. Well, what is greater than a man? A King! And, that's how GutterKing was born.


Since Hubby was now the GutterKing, that made me the Gutter Queen. (Yes, we called our sons Princes, and our daughter Princess, all of the gutters!) But, being Queen of the Gutters is not nearly as glamourous as being Queen of a small country.


As Queen, my queenly duties were to help the King install gutters. The Queen was required to straddle a ladder that was stretched any where from 10 to 32 feet in the air, while holding a piece of gutter, sometimes as long as 80 feet, sometimes with arms stretched above her head, against the facia board, while the King "set" the gutter with his trusty drill gun. Arms can get very tired, very quickly, and so the Queen was not always happy with these duties.


The Queenly winter wardrobe consisted of three to four layers of shirts, lovely orange carharts, three pairs of socks, big yellow boots, and two pairs of gloves. At times, the King would discard his coat, because he would be working up a sweat, and the Queen would quickly confiscate said coat, and add it to her many layers of clothing. Sometimes the Queen had difficulty working because of so many layers, but, the Queen did not like to be cold.


The Queen's head was crowned with a stocking cap, and the hood of a hoodie was tied tightly around her face so that only the bare minimum of skin was exposed. 


The Ladies in Waiting were no where to be  found!


In my quest to be treated as Queen, I found this cute little sign: 

I explained to my family that they should do as the sign suggested.
Except that when I first got this, the "n" on queen looked like an "r". So, when my loving family read the sign, they said, "You want us to treat you like the queer?"


"What??!! No! It says queen, that's an N."


"It doesn't look like queen to us."


That didn't go quite as planned. Then I found a new sign:

The story of my life!

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