Bureaucracy is Slow

Time moved slowly today.  It was drizzling and cold and hard to get out of bed this morning .

Dana came over with Blake and planted some of the  plants we bought yesterday. 

Caroline came to clean the house and Spike barked at her...all the time wagging his tail and looking warily at her vacuum cleaner....and her mask. 

Caroline is keeping tabs on what is happening with the uncleared lots on either side of us because she too lost her house in the same fire and is waiting for her lot to be cleared. The architect has designed her new house and she has chosen all her appliances and finishes but she can't start rebuilding until the debris is removed.

John repaired to the garage to work on building some 'cages' for his raised beds. Dana and I joined him there for a coffee. With only one car, the garage  is quite spacious and I thought John should get some folding chairs down from the rafters so we could sit down, but we really needed to be able to stand up and stamp our feet to stay warm. At least I did.

I took today's picture of Dorrie's lot one one side of us just for the record. She has had some trees taken down but nothing further has been done siince the fire.  The fencing in the bottom of the drainage swale is our new deer fencing. Every so often somebody comes by in a hi-viz vest and wanders around for a few minutes or, in the case of Janet and Paul, whose house on the other side of us is level with the street, uses their property for a parking lot for their bulldozers. 

Caroline has. tried to find out what is going on with little to no luck. An online support group  has given her more information than the county has. I daresay the noise of rebuilding will be difficult too,  but at least it will be a sign that we're going to have next door neighbors again....

Now it is about to get dark but there are pink clouds in a blue sky and it is 6pm!