Dear Diary

Time to catch my regular readers (both of you...) up on current events here at Rancho Not So Grande.

As previously reported, my 96-year-old father is getting more feeble as time goes by. He's in pretty good shape for someone his age, but the time has come to move him into a facility that can provide a higher level of care and assistance than where he's living now. The search for a suitable place has been time-consuming, to say the least. We've finally found one he and we like, and made the necessary arrangements. This weekend I get to load up my truck and make several shuttle runs back and forth between the old and new.

Meanwhile, my wife and daughter have bailed on me and gone off to London. It's a graduation trip for the girl and two of her BFFs, and a boondoggle for their mothers. Yes, it's a 'girls night out' writ large. They'll be there for the best part of a fortnight (if I understand the British time system that's basically two weeks). (No, we're not rich. It's the leftover frequent flier miles and hotel points from my previous career dabbling as a well-traveled consultant.)

And while I'm at it, can someone please explain to me why a simple trip involves multiple, frequent, and lengthy phone calls, followed by immediate and urgent trips to the nearest mall? When I asked my daughter that question I received a withering look and an "Oh, Dad, you wouldn't understand."

She sure got that right.

While they're across the pond stimulating the British economy, I'm stuck at home with our 20-year-old son, two confused dogs who can't understand where the rest of their pack went, and a Siamese Fighting Fish that belongs to one of the other girls on the trip.

Cooking for the boy is a full time job in itself. I swear that kid eats his own weight in groceries every other day. The dogs need extra attention, because the gals were the ones who lavished them with affection, while I do the more mundane tasks of feeding and watering them, and cleaning up after them. Not to mention watering all the plants, filling the bird feeders (seeds for the cardinals, bluebirds, dove, woodpeckers, and sparrows/wrens, thistle for the finches, sugarwater for the hummingbirds, and fruit for the road runners). I'm starting to appreciate the fish more and more - three pellets in the morning and that's it!

My older son runs his own business - a concrete firm. He's on top of things as far as the engineering and construction aspects go, but could do better on the business side (not finding and satisfying customers, but the back office stuff). Lately I've been helping him get that a little more organized and efficient. Interesting and enjoyable, but time-consuming.

Finally, I've been running back and forth between here and our weekend lake cabin, about 90 miles away. It has some maintenance issues that need attention. Nothing major, but nagging little things that need to be done.

On my most recent trip up there - two days ago - I had to run into town for supplies. It was a hot day, and I'd been working hard, so on the way back I stopped off to wet my whistle at Reverend Jim's Dam Pub and Beer Garden. It's a no-frills place (no air-conditioning!) that attracts a varied crowd of locals, bikers, and what is fondly called 'lake trash' (rednecks who live near a lake).

Speaking of lake trash, do you know how to tell if a redneck has class?

The words in his tattoo are spelled correctly...

To give you some idea of the clientele, when I dropped by it was 2:30 in the afternoon. Shortly after I settled in at the bar a regular walked in. He was greeted by another regular who asked him "Are you workin'...?"

That afternoon must have been Geriatric Biker Day. I'm 62, and I had to be one of the three youngest people in the place - and the other two were the barmaids. I'm not kidding - I saw one woman with a pink walker who left on the back of a Harley with an equally elderly gent driving. The walker was strapped to the back of the sissy bar with bungee cords.

There were a number of older guys there with military patches sewn on their Rolling Thunder vests. Some of them needed canes to get around, and their tattoos were faded, but they still had a presence about them that announced "Been there, done that, don't give me no shit." It was, however, a bit disconcerting to watch them line up their pool shots while peering over the rims of their bifocals.

In any event, I was in the shade, a cool breeze was blowing, the beer was cold, and the juke box was rocking. Time passed in a pleasant languor. I didn't get much work done that day (or the next), but my spirit was renewed.

Tomorrow's schedule includes software evaluation and optimizing for the concrete business (I had no idea how complicated it can be estimating the volume of fill and cement needed for a foundation), grocery shopping (again!), and yardwork. Before you get the wrong idea, the boy is going to summer school, part-time interning, and doing odd jobs in his spare time. He's not just laying around playing video games while I wait on him hand and foot.

Anyway, dear diary, I'll leave you with this parting shot. It's not my dog, but I certainly have been in this position before.

Overworked, but still managed to have too much fun...