So...  since the Botanical Gardens, BR has kept busy with some smaller projects a bit closer to home.    Last Saturday a group of 6 (Jim, Jen, Emily, Bill H, Patti, and myself) finished up some work at the Olean Family Literacy Center that was started back during our last local service weekend.   The rooms had been drywalled during that event and required some sanding, minor touch ups and paint.   We completed two small rooms and the hallway.  Of not from this work day was the fact that once again, the police showed up, as we set off the alarm when entering the building.   They were nice enough though, and gave us the number for the maintenance man that was supposed to have disarmed the system prior to our arrival.  Also of note, Bill H. and his wife Patti are from Texas, where they met the BR group during their visit/work in Bridge City and Pass Christian, TX (I know, I already said Texas, but it seemed odd to leave the city without the state).

Today (July 3rd) Jim, Jen and myself traveled to Salamanca (Jim rode his bike (see below)) to finish up a paint job for "Rose" that was started some time last year.   Rose and her friend were very welcoming and extremely appreciative.  We fixed what needed fixed, painted what hadn't been painted yet, and mowed the yard.   Rose provided me with supervision as I painted and told me stories from her past.  Very cool, very nice lady...  I hope we get to work there again.   Of note today, the neighbor lady told us she almost called the police while we were waiting for Rose to answer the door (starting to see a trend?)... 

I think this weekend will also include mowing trails and removing some fallen trees over at Bob's Woods, and maybe some additional clean up at storage if time permits.  

Also, here is an excerpt from http://blakewtd.wordpress.com  Blake is the director of a documentary by 4 students call Walk The Dream (www.walkthedream.com).  We ran into them while we were in Millbury, OH cleaning up after the tornado.

"In the past month we’ve gone through two massive cities (Cleveland and and Chicago) and seen three major storms. The beginning of severe weather started in Huron, OH in the middle of the night. We hadn’t been able to find a place to stay, however a local McDonalds allowed us to park our bus in their parking lot to sleep in. It’s an interesting experience to say I’ve had, sleeping in a McDonald’s parking lot. But when trying to shower and get clean in their bathroom it’s hard to not feel homeless. During the evening a storm passed through which was enjoyable as I sleep very well when it rains. The pitter patter of rain on the roof is soothing to me. However the huge siren going off in the middle of the night wasn’t so pleasant. Holly tried to worry us all by saying it was a tornado warning. But I (being from Rochester, NY were we don’t have such a thing) insisted it couldn’t be. Hah, was I wrong. I didn’t know it until the next morning but a horrible level 4 tornado had touched down about 50 miles away from us. It’s probably better I didn’t know that evening or I wouldn’t have gotten back to sleep so easily.

After finding out the tornado had touched down so close to us we decided it would be well worth the time and extra miles to go to Millbury, Ohio and help out cleaning up from the destruction. I have never experienced a natural disaster (aside from an ice storm that knocked out everyones power in Rochester for a week once). The site of what a tornado can do is life changing. While walking into town we started to notice street signs bent in half, some tree branches down, then a completely naked tree. The school was one of the first things we came across. Half of it was untouched and looked as it was suppose to for the graduation ceremonies that were suppose to be held the day after the tornado had touched down. The other half was spread across a field. Insulation clung to a chain link fence, school buses lay in a row missing windows, doors, and hoods. There were remnants of the school for blocks. Bull dozers pushed heaps of school items together to crush them and put them in the dump. The school was condemned. It is now to be knocked down and rebuilt, at an estimated cost of 50 million dollars.

That was only the beginning of our experiences there. However there is a video you can reference on our facebook page about our visit so you can see a little of what we saw. Much like our trip in general the number of volunteers that came out and helped clean up really reminds you of how kind American’s are. It felt great to be the one to lend a hand after how many people have helped us out. "

-Nate

Sunday was the second day of local service weekend, and WOW, did we get a lot done.  You can read Jim's recap over at BonaResponds.org, but here is a rundown on my contribution...

Began the day at 10am again with a recap of avaialble jobs from Jim.  After that we broke into groups, with myself as part of the Rive Road Cleaan up crew pictured below:

It was our intent to cleanup along the roadway alone, but after surveying the area, it quickly became obvious that the area over the bank, directly next to the rive required significant attention.  I was stunned by the absolute volume of plastic bottles, styrofoam, shoes, typewriters, toys, siding, tires, and various other nonsense that people apparently just toss into the river or along the river bank.  Below is a picture of what we brought up over the hill to be hauled away...

Total count for trash at this location included 28 contractor bags (45 gallon) of trash, 14 tires, and two "mountains" of trash that wouldn't fit in bags.  What's not pictured is another pile of barbed wire and miscellaneous steel that had been tossed.  A few highlights of the day included the state police stopping by after they received reports that we were dumping trash (duh), and Jim's conversation with the township to arrange for the pickup of our collection.  At first they wanted to send only a pickup truck, but after further explanation, agreed that it might be a job more appropriate for the county to handle.  Below is the site after the county came and picked up the trash.  They ended up using a dump truck, a payloader AND a pickup.  The their credit, they also pushed a slab of dumbed blacktop off to the side so the area was more usable.  Jim later wrote his congressman to ask that the site be turned into a picnic area.

After the morning long cleanup, several of us headed off to dissassemble a wheelchair ramp that BR and CYS had put up the year before.  Unfortunately, Bill, the gentleman for whom the ramp was built, passed away a couple of weeks ago.  His wife asked that the ramp be removed so that it can be used later at another location.  We arrived between 1 and 2 pm and began by removing the deck addition that had been added on to the back of the porch to accomodate the length of the ramp.

While the guys worked on this portion of the teardown, I was fortunate to have an opportunity to visit with Mary, Bill's widow, who turned out to be a very kind, sweet, and good-spirited woman.  We talked about Bill, we talked about my uncle, and in some strange way, we bonded.  I could appreciate her feelings, and she could appreciate mine, it was rewarding to say the least...  

We continued by removing the railings and taking the ramp itself apart in two sections.  

We carried both sections, along with the cleaned up lumber to the front of the house for Pete from CYS to pick up on Tuesday night.  We also replanted several of Mary's shrubs and raked out the gravel at the ramp entrance to level the yard.   Mary needs some help with a painting project that she and Bill started, so perhaps we can get some more yard work done when we go over to paint.  Possibly this coming Saturday.

After the work was done at Mary's it was time to wind down the day.  Several crews met at storage to unload tools.  While there, we did some straightening and Jim, Mike, and myself threw together a second toolrack to hold the many rakes, brooms, shovels, etc.  that BR has accumulated.  The day was capped off with a cookout at Univ. Ministries where we shared our accomplishments with each other, and had the pleasure of Mary's company and kind words.

-Nate

Busy, busy, busy...  I took Thursday night off from the ramp build, primarily because I don't think I could have handled looking at it for one more consecutive night.  LOL   Ended up going out Friday night to get most of the railing up, so it will be mostly safe for Dick when he returns home.  Will most likely go out Monday night to cut the tops off of the 4x4s and add the last few railing sections.  When the weather warms up a bit more, I'll add the anti-slip tape to the decking.

Today was Day #2 of Local Service Weekend.  Several jobs were in progress simultaneously, including drywall work at the Literacy Center, tiling at the Cornerstone Medical Loan Closet's new location, Painting and cleanup at a local cemetery, helping out with a Red Cross race on campus, and probably a few others that I can't think of right now.  Brian and I arrived on campus around 10am, after loading the truck up with the chop saw and left over lumber from the ramp build.  Began the day with a run down from Jim and then headed out to the first job site.  Brian, Rob, Carrie, Carrie's mother, Bud and myself went to M. Twitty's house to finish up some railing on, you guessed it, a wheelchair ramp, that the group had built last year.  It was a fairly simple job that Bud and I took care of while the other 3 members of our team scraped and painted the foundation of the home which was flaking, and Carrie's mom kept Mrs. Twitty company in the house.  Carrie then went on to rake the grass in the back yard while we had lunch and waited for our next assignment.  Mrs Twitty was extremely thankful for the help and it was an absolute pleasure to have made her acquaintance.

Next the team split up, with Brian and I heading to the BR storage area to gather up the anchor posts and some other items that we didn't use for Dick's ramp.   We returned these, along with the aforementioned lumber to Home Depot and picked up two sheets of drywall and some paper tape for the job at the literacy center.  At this point, Brian had to head out to attend to a prior obligation.  Having delivered the material to the literacy center, I then went to Bob's Woods on the SBU campus where Bud, Rob, and I worked on leveling some of the rough spots on the trails.  This turned out to be a rather fun time, as Rob and I rode on the back of Bud's 4-wheeler as we brought several loads of bank run out to the trail.

To end the day, we returned a mountain of tools, etc. to the storage area and proceeded to the cookout that was planned at the Univ. Ministry building, where each grouped shared their accomplishments for the day.   A solid day of work overall, with more planned for tomorrow.  

-Nate