Opening the Pool too early and a hole in the pool liner.

After last year everything seems to need to be done early and too excess at least a little bit. We had the pool open last year, but this year I and at least Nastia needed the pool open early. I'd wanted to open it the end of April. It was cold and very unsummerey. Teri commited the coup de gras (this time I used it correctly, not like the

previous blog entry) when she said United Water had most likely already read the meters and we'd get charged summer rates anyway, so I waited. Mid May can sometime, at least over the last few year be unpredictable. Some days are nice and warm, otehrs a little cold. I opened the pool mid May on a weekend. The neighbors maple tree was stil dropping polynoses (When I was young,we called them helicopters) I thought, no big deal, I'll clean them out after I patch the hole in the pool and fill it up.I'm sure the hole is in the floor of the pool. I clean all of the

leaves out of the pool and begin to look for the hole. I walk the pool sure I'll find it at any moment. I don't. To prevent the liner from shrinking Teri says we should fill the pool up. We fill the pool up about three quarter of the way. There is a shortage of chlorine so I don't feel the need to fill the pool all the way up and put chlorine in it. Big mistake, also the temperature drops from the upper 80's to a high in the low 50's for several days. The polynoses continue to fall into the pool and I don't have a skimmer to clean them out. Yesterday I drain the pool, clean the polynoses out and again look for the hole in the pool. Later in the day Nastia comes to help. I put about six inches of water in the pool to stop the liner from shrinking. Nastia rolls up her pants legs and climbes into the icy cold water. She tries to keep her pants dry, but does not succeed when she sits down oh her legs. After that she goes on her hands and knees to look for the hole. After about half an

hour she too has had it. We let the water settle and I drop food dye into the water and it shows nothing. That was it for the day. The next two days it was hot and humid. Late in the day we got thunder storms, so little was done on the pool. Friday, the level of the water had not gone down. So I turned the hose on again and added some more water. I forgot it was on so I called Elena who was still asleep at home asking he rto turn teh water off before she left. I also texted Nastia to make sure the water was off when she got home at around 2:30 from work. THe pool water level as of Saturday morning is about six to eight inches from the water mark where the water was over the winter. The level hasn't dropped. I put a chalk mark on the line and it looks good. More water goes in it later today. I will add more to this post until the pool is up and patched. //

Life goes on and on and on...*

*I guess the alternative is some stranger throwing dirt on your face while you are in a deep hole in a box. Sometimes I feel I just might want to take the stranger, the hole and the box. Life around here has been a little tough. Some of it is Teri and I are getting older and some of it is Teri and I have gotten ourselves into positions at work that are not working any more. For Teri it never really worked. She was hired for a position of customer experence and from day one she has been handling the call center. People have ignored her and just plain old made her job tougher. Now her bosse's boss is unhappy with her job preformance. It's not good, she is very unhappy there. My problems at work are, I was told I care too much, so now I don't care. I still work hard, but when they take the heart out of my insurance food program and allow people to go with out, even though we will get new authorizations for 90+% of the clients, I just do what I'm told and hope God doesn't take it personal. For the girls, life goes on. They are young and in love and that is all that matters. There biggest problems are getting up early in the morning to go to work or go see their boyfriends in the morning. This weekend, Nastia and Branden are going to a hotel in Suffern, I think it is called The Crown Plaza. They are going there to have room service and just hang out. Nastia used to say that alot when she would go out with David. Nastia reassures me they are not going to have sex there. She is over twenty-one and if I told her no she can't go, she would listen, but she is also at that age that she has to take responcibility for her own actions. I'm not saying anything is going to happen Saturday night that hasn't happened before. I just saying She is old enough to do these things and I'm hoping she grows up some by experencing life, if that makes any sense. Elena is still just Elena. She decided to get drunk the other night with Nastia. At Nancy's birthday Elena decided she liked 43. We've had the bottle for years and hadn't touched. 43 is best after eating Mexican food preferrable from El Bandido in Spring Valley when the previous owner was alive and ran the place. Back on Tuesday Elena goes down stairs and gets the 43 again. She gets three shot glasses and pours three shots. I've had two

bottles of beer and I'm just sitting quietly at the table. They offer me a shot and I drink it. They pour themselves several more shots and they peter out pretty quickly. I wasn't going to stop them for drinking. I still want them to wake up with hang overs. I do point out to the both of them that Elena has a controling personality. She controls her intake of mountain dew. It is a soda high in sugar and caffeine. For the longest time every where she went she had a can or bottle of it. Then it was gone replaced by bottles of water. She said she just didn't feel like drinking any. Did Matt say something? Elena in my opinion has the personality to be an

alcoholic. So I keep a closer eye on her then Nastia who after a couple of drinks is done. After dinner and the shots of 43, Elena goes upstairs and Nastia sits with Teri and I watching TV for a while. Neither of the girls wake up with a hang over the next day. 43 is a liqueur with a proof of 62 (highest proof is 200) So I guess it is sort of safe, but it could be that infamous gateway drug that sends Alice down that rabbit hole. I'm hoping Teri and I are being responcible and demystifying the lure of alcohol. All you future people can flip several years into the future and find out. If you do could you leave me a note in the comment section to let me know if I'm making a mistake. /