Another Monday...

Mondays are always interesting... We always have a new crew of short term volunteers and you never quite know what to expect. And today I had a conference call at 7:15 AM, so had to say grace for breakfast, then leave for Auntie Violet and an hour long phone call. Bless Sue's heart, she stepped up to do the after breakfast devotions.

We had the inspection for the stem walls on House #4 today, but the inspector didn't like the length of the rebar, so we didn't get to pour concrete today. The rebar has been lengthened and it'll get another inspection tomorrow and hopefully we'll get the concrete poured. Forry spent most of the day on the road looking for a concrete vibrator to rent. One place had sent theirs out for repair, another didn't rent stuff, another didn't have one... He probably would have been better off staying a camp and letting his fingers do the driving if he had only known.


I spent most of the morning running errands to the post office, to Staples, and to the grocery store; then had lunch with the head of the Long Term Coordinating Committee. When I got back to camp I went with Ken, the construction foreman, to House #1 to take a picture of last week's crew to Elsie. It's amazing to see the progress on that house since we have been here.


A couple more pictures from Saturday:






This is a picture of the very funky Desert Tower near Old Highway 80 close to the Imperial County line. It was built in the 1930s? and is the place to see all of the rather strange Boulder Creatures. From the top of it you can see quite a panoramic view of the Imperial Valley.

These scarecrow-like figures were seen along some of the railroad and highway underpasses. We were told they were the work of a local eccentric who dressed the branches in clothes discarded by undocumented workers...