The latest and hopefully the last blurb about ADT . . .

The latest young man who came today had been here before; I don't recall when but he knew we were from up North and remembered us having a son down here. And . . . I think he really did figure out what was wrong with the system. It seems the men who put it in never removed a magnet from the old system that was here when we bought the house. The magnet was in a hole which had been drilled from the top of the back door down quite a ways. He got on a ladder and drilled down as P&D's Pop watched he brought out a magnet that was interfering with the proper alignment of the magnets the original men had installed back in February 2016. Yup - I think we're all set. I'm still mad at the original men who came here and didn't use the old system to set the alarm.  Instead they decided we needed the new system and it's pretty obvious they didn't know what they were dealing with. We shall see. I hope this is finally right. If it is I'll probably keep the system as the lady manager I spoke with yesterday has given us two free months and lowered the bill too! Phew. It's tough all over.

This morning we went to the park and the men were in the process of taking down my Red-headed Woodpecker's favorite tree. I told them I was heart broken but the man in charge explained there was no nest in the dead tree and with all the kids coming for Halloween treats this weekend they were afraid to let it stay up and wait for it to fall.  He also showed me the tree he says the Woodpecker is using to build a nest.  I told him I didn't trust him and I wouldn't let him know what dead trees and branches I photograph!

Just cooling off . . . blood pressure coming down . . .

Don't even know where to begin - we are still having problems with ADT the security company. It goes back to last year when I wanted the system that was already set up in the house to be activated. I never realized that the two men who came here were not really from ADT. They explained that they were going to put in a different system from what was already here as they couldn't use what was installed blah, blah, blah . . . Needless to say we've have difficulties and because I signed a contract on the technician's iPad where he was actually tapping the screen for me we are stuck. To shorten this diatribe suffice it to say that after two sets of letters explaining all of the problems have been sent to  corporate in Colorado,one last March and one last week, we're still having problems. I called a number I found on line for ADT that didn't look like their usual number where you rarely can get a person unless you want to buy a new system.For the second time in two weeks I explained I wanted out of the contract and she got me in touch with another lady. The second lady seemed nice but couldn't find our contract so I waited patiently as she fumbled around and when she came back she said she had it. So I asked her to make sure the certified letter some one from ADT  Corporate in Aurora, CO had signed for yesterday was in my records. She said she would look and proceeded to hang up on me. Just as I thought I was getting somewhere! So I called the same number I had found on line and this time a youngish sounding man spoke with me. I explained all that had happened and he said over and over again that I had signed the contract and no one would let me cancel it with out paying 70% of the balance. I also asked why my bill had gone up $3 and he said it was in the contract that after a year they can raise your rates. As I became more and more upset and he just kept repeating the same thing even stating that a manager would not allow me to break the contract without paying the 70% which would be about $450 he said, exasperated "What do you want me to do?" I told him to get me the CEO! He said he couldn't do that. So I told him okay then get me a manager. He did. And I'm pleased to say that Miss Betty was on top of everything - she took the extra $3 a month off of the bill; she took the $3.00 a month we were paying for the fob we were told not to use ( the men who put in the system said they had given it to me!) She knew that we had a technician coming out tomorrow between noon and five so she asked me to give them one more try and if I wanted to I could call her next week when she'll be back in the office and cancel the contract at no extra cost to me. Phew - she also explained that she was giving me two months credit so I could keep the system for another two months at no charge and then cancel it! Do you have any idea how hard it is to get anything done when you know that a company has not fulfilled their contract? It's a miracle when you can even get someone on the phone who has any clout what so ever in the company. So we'll see what happens next. There's still a part of me that wants the system working but I'm so pissed off that I may just call it quits. That's it for now.

À la recherche de mon enfance . . .

I really wanted to put A la recherche du temps perdu because that is one of my favorite books but that would be stealing! I should reread Marcel Proust in French because that's the only way to appreciate the beauty of his evocative prose - it's more than poetry, more than art. It grabs you and won't let go. Even after all these years I still feel the sensations recalling at will his written images. Perhaps that is why all sorts of memories keep flooding my brain. One of P&D's Pop's friends and his wife stopped in last week and she always marvels at the little tatted bureau scarves ( don't know what else to call them) on the marble counter. I showed her the wonderful picture my Pépère made for me when I was about five years old and she was amazed. I explained to Cathy that I believe the reason I feel so comfortable and at home in Louisiana is because I brought all of my old stuff with me! ( even P&D's Pop!) I remember Pépé using a drawing from a coloring book to make the design on a piece of cloth and then he embroidered the outlines of the bears and used water colors from our kids' paint set to put in some color. I may have already spoken of this but he also made me a stuffed camel. He drew the camel that was on his cigarette pack onto some cardboard and then wrapped it in brown string and yarn. It even had eyes, a nose and a saddle! How I wish my older sister had also managed to find that too. I think I may have worn it out! She sent me the picture along with Pépé's clock when my older brother was visiting her and he brought it to Moosup for me. Well, I call it Pépé's clock but it may have been my mother's! All I know is that I do not like the sound of clocks ticking but we have the clock right here in the living room as I type and I can't hear it but it is working! I grew up with it for so many years that it doesn't bother me. I'm sure I'd miss it now that P&D's Pop has it working so well. It is the only clock in the whole wide world that ticks and I don't notice it. If I hear ticking clocks I want to silence them even if it means smashing them. That's how strong my dislike is for listening to time marching on!

Talking with my younger sister . . .

My younger sister and I visit with each other by phone almost every Tuesday and today was no exception. It was quite warm in Connecticut and it was very warm here in Louisiana. I started to reminisce about growing up in Moosup. I vividly remembered Mama sending us to the library to get books during the summertime. She loved books and we always got books for Christmas but I think  she used to get us 'out of her hair' by sending us to the library! We would walk up Highland St. Ext. to High St. all the way down to the library on Main. It was always a pleasant walk and Ma always knew if we behaved ourselves because Miss Main ran the upstairs and Miss Dolly Barber the downstairs so Ma could always check on us. It's odd that I can picture these two women - Dolly was short and a bit stout with dark hair and used to tell me stories about Ma teaching her how to set type at the Journal Office. I recall her saying, 'Dolores would tell you to pay attention because she was only going to tell you how to do something once. So you paid attention!' Not sure why this has stuck with me. Miss Main was a very sweet, grey haired lady and strict about the rules, a perfect librarian. I used to love going to the library. We would sometimes walk home by Main Street and up Church cutting across the parking lot at Paul's Package Store to get home. When I was little I used to make sure no one crossed our lot as a shortcut and would tell them to 'Get off my propity!' What a pain in the derrière I was! I think the big kids laughed at me.

I remember sleeping out in an army tent Pa would set up in the back yard. The girls in the neighborhood would sleep out together one night and the guys got a chance the next night. The worst thing that I remember about that is rolling over on the army cot, yes we had cots! and I felt something cold and clammy squish under my side. I jumped out and grabbed the flash light to see that I had squished a huge, monster green ugly tomato bug. I do believe I decided to sleep in my own bed after that. I remember all of us kids, neighborhood kids too, singing songs in our living room while my older sister played the piano and I still get teary eyed when I remember when it was my turn in the heat of a summer night to sleep on the porch swing and listen to Butch aka Tex Lévesque play his guitar upstairs at his house across the street. I think he used to sit out on their porch roof. Butch died while he was serving in the US Army in Italy - it seems he had drunk too much and left a bar feeling sick; he didn't want to ask anyone for help. He was found dead outside near the stairway. I still feel the loss and that was so long ago. I remember Ma wouldn't let me stay outside to play in the summer after 7 o'clock. It was so unfair! So I'd creep out of bed and sneak to the hall window and watch the older kids playing. I even saw Georgie break his arm as his brother Charlie was playing 'airplane' with him! Holy cow. I don't know why all of these memories are flooding in tonight. We had a heck of a good neighborhood and most of the time all the kids played in our yard because my mother loved to watch us play especially the pick up baseball games. To pick the players for a team two of the older boys would throw a bat and work their hands around the bat one after the other; who ever managed to get the last hand on the bat would be able to start calling the name of the best player he wanted to start on his team. Then the other boy would name his player and back and forth until everyone was taken except me because I was always the littlest. But usually Charlie would let me play on his team kinda like the bat girl! And I remember Ma would have to referee if the kids got out of hand. At the end of almost every summer the older kids would get together before school started and bring Ma a big bouquet of flowers with a fancy card thanking her for letting the whole neighborhood play in our yard. We even played football on Saturdays in the Fall and Charlie would still pick me for his team. He was a big guy and must have been about 15 to my 7 years old. His team would get the ball to me and before anyone could tackle me he'd protect me all the way to the goal and if he had to he'd make like a cave with his body and I would sneak under him for the touchdown! Tonight, I refuse to remember my little sister Louise getting a very high fever one evening and dying. I had to sleep at my Aunt and Uncle's across the street while all of the adults and Charlie and the doctor tried to save her. I remember eating hazelnuts and shagbarks, fishing and cowboys and Indians, swinging my life away on the numerous swings we had on the front porch and under the big maple, swimming at Moosup Pond, getting the eggs at the neighbor across the street. I remember Pa and Ma putting up a sheet on the wall in the living room and showing movies to all of the neighborhood kids and even adults. My mother would charge the adults a safety pin to get in. She was always short of safety pins for the baby's diapers! I remember picking raspberries with Pa while Ma and Pauline picked them over and made up gorgeous baskets of the best berries on earth and then Pa would put them in our wagon and we'd walk down Church Street and sell them. I think we sold them for .50 and even Dr. Barry bought some from us. I remember  Gert Panasuk's ice cream parlor, literally her parlor  which was just across the lot from us. Ma would send us to get some odds and ends and Gert would put the change in the bag with the bread or whatever we had bought. Ma didn't realize that the change was in the bag and used to throw the bags in the garbage which Pa would burn every Saturday. You know we found a lot of black change under the barrel when the bottom gave out! I remember my friend Sylvinia Pareno whose family spoke Spanish and whose Dad was involved in trying to overthrow Castro. My friend Karen and I have tried to find her but we haven't yet. The last Karen knew Sylvinia was in New York City and that must be at least 50 years ago. I remember stopping on the way home from school in Potvin Village to see Mon Oncle Sam and Ma Tante Bernadette. She would be making home made doughnuts and Mon Oncle would be cleaning up after her! Best honey dipped doughnuts ever as she would let me dip them in the honey for her. Well that's it for tonight.

Oh my goodness . . .

First rate glorious day . . . we've already had a good breakfast at James' Grill in old Denham Springs, gone to Livingston to vote early, found out where to go for concealed weapon permit and classes, picked up a box and packed it to send off to middle child with all things MaTante Rose and gotten P&D's Pop off to South Park as I head out to get a haircut, mail the package and pick up some more beautiful gourds for my front porch basket. Fall in Louisiana is pretty near perfection.

Took a break from writing to walk my four circles around the neighborhood and got a phone call from Kiddo that he needed us to help with a homework assignment. That was pretty neat. His Dad, P&D's Pop and I used FaceTime to explain to him some old slang expressions. His teacher said the kids had to talk to some older folks - 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's! Hell that makes me feel young. He's looking and sounding so fine - I think 13 years old agrees with him. He also seems more out going - perhaps the new school is a very good thing for him.

Just finished eating supper and it was pretty darned good - roast pork surrounded by little gold potatoes and onions with only salt and pepper for seasoning cooked together in the oven at 350 degrees - with tossed salad and applesauce as a side it was a mini feast. No special dessert but I do have Blue Bell Vanilla Cups topped with either chocolate, coffee or blackberry sauce. Fantastique.

I may return to my blog more often - uncertain about that. I like Facebook but get annoyed with it and myself at times. This seems like a more comfortable outlet for my daily love or dislike of life! I tend to be more hyper than beat down - as a matter of fact I have never felt beaten just aggravated. C'est la vie, n'est-ce pas? À toute à l'heure. Heck, my French is as rusty as the devil. Peut être je vais essayer d'écrire en français quelque fois. Ce sera bon pour la tête et le cœur. Bunny day!