Sept. & Oct. 2018 By The Numbers

September – October 2018.

Welcome to the numbers of our lives, a (hopefully) fun way of giving you a little insight into our unusual life.

We like to count things. I mean numbers are pretty cool. And they can be fun. And when you start breaking things down into numbers they can become especially insightful or sometimes just plain weird.

Here are a few fun number facts I found on the internet:

19 – The topmost number of cats that Mark Twain kept at one time with such monikers as Apollinaris, Beelzebub, Blatherskite, Buffalo Bill, Satan, Sin, Sour Mash, Tammany, Zoroaster, Soapy Sal, and Pestilence. Twain once said, “If man could be crossed with the cat it would improve man, but deteriorate the cat.”

163 – Better known to westerners as Bangkok, the Thai city of
Krungthepmahanakhon Amonrattanakosin Mahintharayutthaya Mahadilokphop Noppharatratchathaniburirom Udomratchaniwetmahasathan Amonphimanawatansathit Sakkathattiyawitsanukamprasit is the long geographical name in the world.

36,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000, 000,000,000,000, 000,000 – Mass (in kilograms) of OJ287, the largest measured supermassive black hole.

But really I know you are not all here to learn weird and interesting factoids that I plucked from the world wide web – you want to know about OUR weird and interesting factoids. But before we start counting, here is a little plain old recap in plain old words …

Although we were still house sitting for most of September and October we did lots of traveling both months. We visited lots of family in between house sits in September, said our goodbyes in Cabbagetown mid-October, spent a couple of weeks getting the van ready to travel, and then hit the road! But enough of telling you about stuff – let’s get to tallying it all up!

Sleeping & Pets

26 – Days house sitting. Quite a few less than the previous months. We had several gaps in our schedule in September which gave us the opportunity to do a little traveling.

11 – Different beds we slept in. This includes 6 beds visiting friends and family, 5 beds in Cabbagetown (two in the same house – I was mistaken about when the owner was getting home so we stayed over one night).

12 – How many times we woke in different places in the van. Sometimes I am amazed that I hardly never wake up confused as to where we are.

 

1 – Cats house sat. Princesa Zara Raj. Repeat! This was our second stint with one of our favorite felines.

4 – Dogs house sat. Jasmine, Lucy, Bob, and Dave. More repeats! The pet sitting of the styling and beautiful Jasmine and Lucy was a continuation from the end of August. October saw our second stint with the wild and goofy Bob and Dave.

66 – House sitting gigs we have on the calendar for next summer. Up 42 since our last Numbers post. Really – It never hurts to book early.

And here are a few end-of-our-house-sitting-season (May 11 – October 10) totals for those who haven’t been counting along:

8 – Cats house sat. Nola, Cosmo, Little Joe, Jack Bauer, Panda, Smudge, Buddy, & Zara

11 – Dogs house sat. Lucy W, Mike, Eliot, Kofi, Mr. Chien, Gus, Daisy, Bob, Dave, Lucy J, and Jasmine

This is probably the least number of pets we have sat over the summer. We had several longer stints than we had in previous years.

Work & Volunteer Summer Wrap-up Numbers

28 – Painting projects completed by Greg and his partner Paul this past summer. Including:

• 5 – Entire exterior houses (3 in Cabbagetown).
• 1 – Doghouse.
• And numerous, bedrooms, kitchens, porches, touch up jobs, and a couple of emergency paint jobs.

36 – ads placed by me since June on Craigslist for my friend David Thayer. David contacted me at the beginning of the summer about posting some ads for him. He was really ill last year and almost died. Although he has recovered and is at home, he now lives in a wheelchair and his business (as a stone mason and landscape artist) has gone downhill. His health is on a decline again and when I went to see him he was depressed about his financial struggles and the abandonment of him by of some friends. (In defense of his friends, David’s health was surely declining again due to many self-imposed vices and some of his friends felt they just couldn’t be a party to it.)

David had already taken some of his money problems in hand and had contracted with a realtor to sell the lot adjacent to his house. The problem with that, though, was all the stuff on the lot.

David is a hoarder – enough of a hoarder that his place was featured on American Pickers. The lot next to his house had at one time been the venue for many crazy Cabbagetown parties with all its unusual features, but now it was just full of junk that needed to go. David doesn’t do the internet but he is savvy enough to know that that is where you go to sell things these days. I placed an ad for a yard sale over the weekend and then the next few after that on Craigslist, Next-door, Facebook, and Yardsales.net. Fourth of July rolled around and David wanted to do a sale that day too. It was so successful, the sale became perpetual, every day of the week, 9 am to 5 pm until I left Cabbagetown. I also placed ads to rent his upstairs rooms in his house, and ads to get rid of specific things in his yard – a huge pile of 30-year-old compost, Fifteen 8’ 6”x6” posts, rusty metal vintage yard furniture, and a gazebo.

298 – Responses to Facebook inquiries to the ads I placed for David on Facebook Marketplace. Unlike Craigslist ads where you can specify a phone number for responses, Facebook only allows responses to come through Facebook Messenger. The first ad I placed for David on FB was for his vintage metal yard furniture. I got an inquiry immediately and then one every 15 minutes after that for a couple of days. As frustrating as it was to have to respond to all of these inquiries, it was good to know that the ads were getting noticed.

At the end of the summer, David treated Greg and me with a dinner picked up from a local upscale Cabbagetown restaurant, Agave. We ate in his living room which you could barely walk through months before. David, most likely a curmudgeon from birth, was bright and happy. He had steady income from his two renters. His sale had brought people to his house every day which not only brought him more income but brought him people to talk to. His lot had sold for a very good price and although he still had lots of junk to sell, it was confined to his side of the property. And he was finally finishing his house – a beautiful old two-story Cabbagetown house, half done as long as I had known it – a mixture of some of David’s amazing masonry work and unfinished drywall and rotting wood floors. David kissed my hand and said he wanted to treat us one more time before we went, but we didn’t have enough time. I promised him we’d do it again next summer.

Fun

3 – How many times I took pictures of the Atlanta skyline at sunset from a roof. The absolute best view of Atlanta is from the top of the Stacks Lofts in Cabbagetown. Lucky for us some of our favorite people in Cabbagetown (Vic and Jo) own a loft at the Stacks and are always inviting us (and everyone else) for drinks, parties, and get-togethers.

1 – Times Greg played live for an actual money paying audience. It was the second performance by the Cabbagetown Cowboys – this time it was a Johnny Cash tribute and benefit at a local club, The Star Bar.

78 & 85 – My bowling scores. Not a whole lot better than last month.

115 & 122 – Greg’s bowling scores. He absolutely killed us.

2 – How many people Greg has corrupted with musical instruments. Warning – be careful when mentioning to Greg that you have the slightest bit of interest in learning an instrument.

When we visited Greg’s daughter Jessica in September she mentioned that the grandson, Gabe, had expressed an interest in learning the violin. A violin appeared at David Thayers perpetual estate sale the last week we were in Cabbagetown and since David was having a hard time giving me anything from the sale he gave Greg the violin when he asked for it in my stead. Greg fixed it up and left if wrapped at his parents’ house for when Gabe comes to visit next.

In October we made an overnight visit to Greg’s son and daughter-in-law Taylor. Sometime that evening Taylor made comment about wanting to play the ukulele. The next day as we were leaving town Taylor became the brand new owner of a uke which she bought and Greg helped her pick out. While we were still in the store Greg gave her a quick lesson on the chords she would need to know to play the first song she wanted to learn, Jolene.

35 – How many years since I dated Mike, the ex-boyfriend of mine who we saw on our friends and family trip in September. I only mention this so could include this goofy picture of us to this post.

3 – How many pictures of me that appear in this post. Must be a record. Of course, since I am the picture taker – Greg still beats me by 2.

1 – How many dinner parties I threw. We get so busy during the summer that sometimes we neglect some of our friends. We didn’t get to see Debbie, one of our besties, much during our time in Cabbagetown so we had her and Greg’s painting partner, Paul, over for homemade Indian food.

Travel

17 – Family members visited. We made a quick visit to Greg’s daughter, son-in-law, and gorgeous grandson over a two day gap in our house sitting schedule in September, made a journey to Pennsylvania to visit my Aunt Eunice and her family, spent a couple weeks with Greg’s parents after we left Cabbagetown where we got to visit with Greg’s brother Ken and a couple of his cousins, spent a night in Greenville SC with Greg’s son James and his wife, and visited my niece Ariadne in New Orleans at the beginning of this season’s journeys on our way west (more about our New Orleans visit next post!).

62 – Camping sites on my Mexico map. Ok – right now this very moment we are in Tucson Arizona still researching our Mexico trip. Greg has plotted our way down to Mexico City and has added a significant amount of potential camping locations to our map. We hope to cross the border soon!

* Click pics to enlarge and open into a slideshow.

What numbers have been significant in your life lately? Do you know any fun number factoids?