Sam's Year of Service Adventure

 Today I was with Tony all day.  We started by going over to Ceders, and I replaced some smoke alarm batteries while we fixed a sink.  After we were done at Ceders, we went over to VSR to pick up a key from a resident so we could make a copy.  On our way to making the key, we found out that painters had arrived at our make-ready, so we had to turn around and help them get started.  We realized we barely had any of the paint we actually needed when we thought we had plenty.  We got them started on what we had and then went to get the keys copied.  After we had our keys copied, we went to Sherwin-Williams and picked up 10 gallons of paint for the painters.  Once we finally had them started, I finally got to work on the make-ready and replaced a TP holder and put the stove back together from when it was apart for cleaning.  We also realized that the cleaners had missed a drawer when they cleaned, so I had to clean it out.  Another thing I d...

 Today I attended my first all-staff meeting.  They quickly put me on the spot as we were introducing new people, and I didn't handle that pressure too well.  I couldn't think of 2 truths and a lie.  I just told them three truths.  After that, we heard from all the departments and what was going on within the organization.  After the meeting, we went to Clarke Melon Apartments for inspections.  There are not very many apartments here, so it was quick.  After that, we went over to the Ridge for an eviction.  When we got there, the tenant answered the door and decided to go get a money order and pay his rent.  Then I went with Tony over to VSR, and we visited with Mark, the leasing agent, for a while about all the crazy things that had been happening on the property.  When we were done visiting, I took some pictures of damage in one of the rooms and then helped Josh make and hang some doors.  After we were done with the doors, we...

 Today was pantry day, and it was a hectic mess.  We started with doing our pickups, and we got really stuck in construction, so the pickups took longer than they should have.  We had the worst haul we had ever had from Sprouts.  We only had about 6 boxes.  Thankfully, Trader Joe's was an ok haul.  We had to heavily limit the amount of food we were handing out.  Our food amounts were about one-third of what they usually are.  When we got started, we had a rush of people for about an hour and a half.  We had to watch all the food carefully so that people didnt take more then they were allowed because we were very worried we were very worried about running out.  I had to tell a lot of people to put food back because they took too much and apparently can't read the signs.  It would be nice if people were less selfish in this situation because everyone is struggling, and everyone should have an equal opportunity to get food.  We ha...

 Today I was with maintenance.  I rode with Frank.  The first thing we did was go to Ceders and put batteries in a smoke detector.  After that, we had three evictions to do.  When we do evictions, we have the police come and ensure the rooms are clear. Then, all the maintenance staff and a group of leasing agents help clear the room if possible.  Usually, the rooms are so trashed that we don't clean anything out.  We started at U.P., then went to Plaze, and then went to Woodbine.  After completing the evictions, we went to East Hills and began working on replacing a toilet.  It had 2 big cracks in it, so it was not fixable.  We got the old one out and then had to wait for a while for Tony to bring us the new one.  We got the new one in without much trouble, but then we also found out that the shower drain was clogged, so we worked on that for a long time, and we didn't get it much better before we had to give up.  Then we went ...

 Today was a crazy day.  We started by going to Sprouts and picking up our donation and it was pretty slim as expected.  We got it all put away at the pantry and then I got the cleaning done.  When I was done cleaning we tried to get out temp gun calibrated but we relized we gave away the pot that we had at the pantry so we coulnt boil any water.  After that we went back to the office and had lunch.  After lunch we ran over to Colorado West to get some keys from a resident.  Then we went back to Plaza because a resident wanted to give us three 75 inch TVs.  He didnt want to tell us how he got them and we didnt ask.  We couldnt fit all three in our van so we had to make 2 trips.  When we first went over to Plaza there were a whole bunch of cops there because their had been a fight and apparently a protitute hanging out there.  Not good.  When we got the TVs unloaded we went over to Woodbine and picked up some books to restock li...

Today we had church.  Grandma and grandpa picked me up for church, and we headed over.  We had a nice service, and then I helped in the kids' Sunday school again.  I made sure that Grandma and Grandpa found the adult class.  After church, we went out to eat at Rudy's for Mexican food.  It was really good and the view was great.  After lunch, I said goodbye to grandma and grandpa, and then Christian and I went shopping.  We are pretty tight on our budget this month, so we were very careful shopping.  After we were done shopping, I did nothing the rest of the afternoon, and then I fell asleep around 5 and didn't wake up until 8.  Then I made some grilled cheese for supper and then went to bed.

 For breakfast today, I ate a Bruegger's burger that Grandma and Grandpa had brought me.  Today, I spent most of the day showing Grandma and Grandpa around the city.  I started by showing them the pantry and Bentley Commons.  I have spent the most time at these 2 places.  Then I showed them Enfield and Arcadia just for some different-looking apartments.  Then we stopped by the church and also looked at the community garden.  After that, we went to the atrium and checked it out.  Then we drove to the Garden of the Gods and walked around there for a while.  It was an absolutely beautiful day to go for a walk, and we even did a trail that I had never done before.  After the Garden of the Gods, it was time for a late lunch, so we went to In-N-Out, and it was packed.  We had some pretty good burgers.  After In-N-Out out we went over to Old Colorado City and checked out our Colorado West property and the Pikes Peak property that Grec...

 Today, I did the same thing as I did yesterday.  I painted 2 walls in different parts of the office.  I painted the wall right by the main entrance and then another wall next to a side entrance.  I spent the whole morning doing the front because there was so much stuff to tape off.  After I ate some lunch, I did the side wall, which didn't take super long because the wall was pretty small and there was not a lot to tape around.  Then I went back to working on the resident directory and was able to finish that up.  I got let off work early, and Grandma and Grandpa Abrahams stopped by the office to see where I worked.  Then I biked home, and grandma and grandpa drove and met me there.  They hung out at the house and visited for a while, and I showed them around.  Then they took me out to eat at 503W, and it was packed.  We did get some really good burgers and had some time to catch up.  Then we went back to the house, and they d...

 Today I spent almost the whole day painting the office.  I was assigned to paint the very top section of the roof where it juts out in the middle.  I was working on the siding on the sides and then around a large window.  I first had to figure out how to get a five-gallon bucket of paint up to the office, which was not an easy task.  Once I had everything I needed up there, I started taping off the windows and other areas I didn't want to get paint on.  I then had to get the paint from the big bucket into a little tiny bucket that I could actually carry around.  This was a huge mess, but there wasn't a much better way.  I spent most of the morning with a little brush going around things, and then quickly finished up with the roller brush.  Bill was very impressed that I finished up so quickly, so we walked around the office and looked at other places that needed paint.  We decided on another wall for me to spend the afternoon painting w...

 Today was pantry day.  We were a little short on help, which was both a blessing and a curse, as some of the annoying volunteers were gone, but they did manage to accomplish some tasks.  Doug and I went and did the pick-ups, and they were not bad, but not great.  Once we had everything put away, we had lunch.  After lunch, we opened up, and boy, was it busy.  It was kind of a frustrating day.  One of the volunteers kept yelling at us, and he wouldn't follow directions, which made the freezers get way too warm because he would leave them open.  Anyway, we also realized how much the government shutdown was going to make the pantry crazy.  A lot of the people who live in our housing rely on social security to buy food, pay rent, etc.  This means that the pantry is going to get extra busy because people are no longer able to afford the food they once could.  We saw a lot of people in the pantry who don't usually come there because they...

 Today was a combination of resources and maintenance.  I started my day by cleaning out the gutters at the office, and they were completely full of pine needles.  It took a while because I had to clean up the huge piles of needles that I had thrown on the ground.  When I was done cleaning out gutters, I worked on the resident directory for a few hours.  I am updating the residents' information so that maintenance and leasing have it on record.  After that, I had some lunch before Doug, Jenni, and I headed over to the atrium to help Care and Share set up their mobile market.  When we got there, we found out that the parking lot never got blocked off for the truck to park, so we had to park it on the street.  Care and Share brought a few volunteers with them, so we didn't have a whole lot to do.  The truck was much better stocked than the last month.  I was able to take some beef jerky since there was so much of it, and it wasn't bad....

 Today I had to start my day with a long morning meeting that didn't have a lot of relevance to me.  When we were done with our meeting, I sorted out the moldy bread, and then we headed to Sprouts to do our pick up.  Today we got 98 bags of popcorn, so we weren't really sure what we would do with that much.  I will have to be a salesman on Wednesday to get rid of it.  After we had put all the food away, we had to deep clean the pantry because we are having an inspection from Care and Share the next day.  We had to hose off a lot of the food bins that we had; we had to wipe out all of the fridges really well, and we had to go through our fridges and triple-check that there was no food in them going bad.  It took like 2 hours to hose everything off.  When we were done with the deep clean, I still had to do my basic cleaning tasks, and then we were done with the pantry and headed back to the office.  Once we had dropped some stuff off, we headed...

 When we woke up this morning, it was really cold.  It has been the coldest day since I have been here.  We went to church this morning, heard pastor Jordan preach, and then had Sunday school afterwards.  I helped in the kids' class again, and they are just a crazy bunch of kids.  After church, I didn't do much the rest of the afternoon.  I received my care package in the evening after supper.

 Today we got up early and headed to Castle Rock for the MCC sale.  When we got there, we got to have breakfast with MDS and listen in on their annual meeting.  We got to hear about all the projects in our region.  After breakfast, I wandered around the sale for a while.  I bought some cheese curds from the cheese booth.  Then I got myself a bidding number and sat through the general auction.  There were not a lot of things I was very interested in watching sell, but I did bid on a couple of toy tractors.  I didn't win anything.  After the general auction was mostly over, I went and bought a bierock for lunch, and got a dr pepper.  When I was done eating, I went and helped run the cider press for a while.  The cider press ran off a John Deere engine.  I spent my whole time there just tossing apples into the crusher.  The belt on the press was really bad, so it kept falling off.  I was able to get the belt back on, but...

 Today, we got to sleep in for a while before heading up to Castle Rock to set up for the MCC Sale.  When we got there, we spent our morning setting up stuff for the fair trade booth.  This booth sells items that were fairly made, basically.  If you would like to learn more, they will be set up at Hesston College in the near future.  When we got the booth set up, they provided us with pizza and cookies for lunch.  After lunch, we thought we were going to be pressing cider, but the cider press never showed up.  Instead, we helped set up the plants booth, and we also set up more tables and chairs.  We did whatever was needed because we had nothing else to do.  We waited around all afternoon, and our press never showed up.  Eventually, they dismissed us because there was no more work.  When we got home, Christian and Leigha's new E-bike was delivered, so I decided to try and get it put together.  I got it rideable, but I didn't ha...

 Today was an interesting day.  I did a lot of different stuff at work.  I started by riding with Doug to Goodwill to donate a table that was in the way at the pantry.  Then we went over to Pikes Peak, where we had one last person to move.  This was thankfully a pretty easy move.  A lot of his stuff was packed, and there were not too many big pieces.  He had a detailed plan made, which made it very easy to know what to pack first and what to unpack first.  The apartment smelled like smoke, and it was dusty, but overall, it could have been a lot worse.  Once we got him to his new apartment, we pretty much had to squeeze everything in since it was so much smaller than his old one.  When we were done moving, we headed back to the office, where we regrouped, and then Jeni, Doug, and I went out to lunch.  We went to a fancy burger place, and it was really good.  We also had some great lunch conversations.  After lunch, we went ...

 Today we got up, packed up the hotel room, and then headed over to the Airbnb for breakfast.  Mary made us French toast.  After breakfast, we helped pack up the truck before we said goodbye.  We decided to spend our extra time touring around the area.  We started by going to some hot springs that were nearby.  I didn't get in, but Michael did, and the springs were around 120 degrees.  After the springs, we went to the nearby college to look at the castle that is on campus.  Then we started heading towards Taos.  Some of the roads in Las Vegas had a lot of water running on them.  When we made it to Taos, we went and looked at a really cool cathedral.  It was made of mud on the outside.  We also visited some art shops near the cathedral, where we found some extremely expensive paintings.  Then we headed to the town square, where we ate lunch and walked around several more stores.  We found a chocolate shop where we got...

Today we got up a little later because it was raining and there was no point in getting up earlier.  We headed to the Airbnb where Mary had made an egg casserole for breakfast.  After breakfast, Christian led us in a blessing, and we made lunch.  We headed out to the same area we were working in yesterday.  We had a lot of piles of sticks to chip.  We spent a good 2 to 3 hours chipping, and we had made it down to our last pile.  Then we couldn't get the chipper running again.  When we tried to engage the clutch, it made the belt squeal.  We thought we had ruined the belt on the chipper, so we pulled the chipper to a flat area, and I got to work taking the shields off the belt.  This thing has the biggest belt I've ever seen, but it was in good shape and was adjusted properly.  So then we decided to lift the auger up and see if the blades were plugged.  We found a chunk of wood jammed in the blades, which we spent 20 to 30 minutes tr...

Today, we started by heading to the Airbnb where Mary had made us breakfast.  We also packed lunches and then headed out to the job site, which was about 30 minutes away.  Once we got there, we found out that we had loads of trees to cut.  We ended up falling 10+ trees today.  I learned how to properly fell a tree today.  We had a very knowledgeable guy teaching us how to cut trees.  I spent most of my time bucking the fallen trees or cutting the branches off.  I also got to run the wood chipper a little bit.  Once we had felled all the trees and done almost all the wood chipping, we got rained out and headed back to the Airbnb.  When we got there, Mary had made spaghetti for supper.  After supper, we played some phoose ball before heading back to the hotel and sitting in the hot tub for a while.  Then I headed to bed.

Today we had church.  I had communion for the second time.  We also had Sunday school, and since I thought the adult class was boring the previous week, I decided to join the kindergarten through 5th-grade class, and it was much more exciting.  After church, we had lunch and got packed for the MDS trip.  Around 2, we headed out and drove 4 hours straight to Las Vegas, New Mexico.  This is a very different unit from the ones I had previously been in.  This unit is operating out of an Airbnb, and there is essentially no money.  They can only work sometimes because they can't afford to work more.  There is also no building involved, as we are here to just cut up trees and run the wood chipper.  When we arrived, we were served a meal of chili and then had chainsaw training.  This was quite boring, but I learned a few things.  After our training, we headed to a nearby hotel where we are staying for the three days we are here.

 Today we slept in since it was Saturday.  When we got up, we ate breakfast and did some chores around the house before heading to Aurora to attend Activate.  This is a building full of fun, active games to play.  There are probably around 100 different games we could play.  One of my favorites was a game where we could through dodgeballs at asteroids to destroy them.  We played games for about an hour and a half before heading home.  When we got home, we didn't do a whole lot.  Christian made some spaghetti for supper, which was very tasty.  We finished the evening by playing some Overcooked.  The more we play this game, the more exciting it becomes.

 Today was a different day.  We had a mobile vet clinic at the office today, giving free vaccines and checkups to the cats and dogs of Greccio residents.  We started at about 9 in the morning and had people bringing in their cats and dogs until about 3.  I was the person who had to make all the calls to remind people that they had a vet appointment today. There was not a single person who had forgotten, so I felt useless.  On the bright side, I did get to play with dogs all day and talk with all the residents.  This is a really cool program that Greccio can offer because none of these people can afford a vet.  The veterinarian who performs this service converted an RV into a mobile clinic.  She runs the clinic on grants.  After we were finished, we helped clean up, and then I got to go home early.  When I got home, I relaxed for a while before grilling up some brats for everyone to enjoy.  We finished the night by watching a couple ...

 Today, I was with maintenance, and I actually got to do something besides taking pictures and performing warranty work at Bentley.  I started by accompanying a few people on some inspections.  We didn't find anything crazy besides a motorcycle that needs to be towed.  After that, we went to the mechanic's shop to pick up Frank's van.  Then he and I went over to Enfield and flipped a breaker for a resident with no power in her kitchen.  Then we went over to Kittyhawk and replaced a mailbox lock.  After that, we went over to Colorado West to replace some blinds.  We had to measure the old ones and then go to Lowe's to get new ones.  Lowes didn't have the right size, so we had to have them custom-cut.  When we got back, we thought it would be a simple install because we could just use the old holes.  However, the new brackets didn't line up, so we had to drill new holes.  When we tried that, we found out that the wall had been fi...

 Today was pantry day.  We started with the usual morning meeting, before heading over to the pantry to drop Jenni off. Then, Doug and I went and did our pickups.  We did not get a lot of food today.  Luckily, we ended up hardly having anybody at the pantry.  We were through our sign-up list within 30 minutes of being open.  We did have plenty of people trickle through that were not signed up at the beginning, so thankfully, we were kept busy.  However, we were not kept busy enough for us not to spend some time cleaning out the kitchen at the pantry. I don't know why we had some of the stuff that was in there.  We had way more cleaning supplies than we would ever need, and we also had a bunch of dishes that would never be used.  We also tried running the dishwasher for the first time in who knows how long, and it caused the sink to back up.  Luckily, one of the maintenance guys was there and was able to help get the garbage disposal unpl...

 Today was a different day.  I was with maintenance, but I started my day with resources because all the maintenance guys had left me.  I started by running over to Woodbine and picking up some totes to collect books from Goodwill.  Then I just waited around until 9, when we headed over to Bentley for the grand opening.  I spent most of the morning helping set up for the event.  I had to help set up chairs and the podium.  We just helped out where needed, doing the odd jobs.  When it was time to start, Tony and I had to direct traffic so that people could park in the designated spots.  When the event started, it was a lot of people talking about Bentley, whom I had no connection with.  They were mostly just rich people who funded and decided how Bentley would be built.  After the speeches were over, there was a ribbon-cutting, and then refreshments and time for tours around the property.  While all the rich people were enjoying...

 I had to start my day at work today by trying to get my work email working.  I ended up spending about an hour on the phone with IT trying to figure it out.  After we got that figured out, I headed over to the pantry to help unload the pickup that Doug and Jenni had done while I was on the phone.  We had a lot of bread today.  After all the food was put away, I started cleaning while Jenni went and picked up more food.  She got back with a lot of Starbucks sandwiches and cake pops.  When that stuff was put away, I finished cleaning and took temperatures of all the fridges and freezers.  Then we headed back to the office for lunch.  After lunch, we did quite a few libraries before heading back to the office around 3.  I did a few random jobs before taking some unnecessary books to Goodwill for a donation.  When I was done with that, I headed back to the office and then home.  When I got home, Michael was making supper.  He...

 Today, Christian and Leigha made us breakfast.  We had bacon, pancakes, and eggs.  During breakfast, we had our weekly business meeting.  Then we headed to church.  We had Osheda Moore preaching today, and she spoke extensively about how to peacefully address racism.  After the service, we had donuts and coffee as usual.  After church, we headed home, and I decided I was going to diagnose the van because we aren't really sure if we are getting a new car or not.  I had Christian hold the voltmeter on the battery until we found the draw.  We ended up finding that the sliding doors were causing the draw.  After we fixed the draw, we left the battery charger on for the rest of the afternoon to ensure our battery was fully charged.  I decided to finish The Shining since I had fallen asleep while watching it the night before.  I didn't do much most of the afternoon, and then we watched another episode of Severance in the evening....

 Today I got up early and biked up to Red Rock Canyon to hit the trails up there.  I had to do a lot of uphill riding to get to my trailhead.  It was a nice ride back down.  I also sampled the jump trail, which didn't turn out well.  After my bike ride, I went home to shower and rest for a little while.  Then I went out again on my bike to go to a car show in Old Colorado City.  It was not the best car show, but it was pretty cool.  After the car show, I came back and played Terraforming Mars with Christian and Leigha.  Since this game usually takes about 3 hours, it took the rest of the afternoon.  Then I had to put the battery back in the van again so that we could go over to Adrian's house for supper club.  Elliot and Jane, 2 other people from our church, also joined us for supper.  We had pulled pork with some side salads.  After supper, we played some games.  When we got home, some of us decided to watch The Shin...

 Today I was with maintenance again.  I spent the whole morning doing the last of the warranties.  After lunch, I helped Tony and Frank do some of the work orders around Bentley.  After work, we didn't do much.  We had supper, visited for a while, and then made some plans for the next day.

 Today I got to ride my bike to work again for the first time in a month.  I was reminded that I have big wheels on my bike, making it more work to ride on the road.  When I arrived at work, I found out that we were skipping the morning meeting again, so Posh took me straight to Bentley.  I had finished all the vacant units that needed warranties on Tuesday, and now I had to go door to door asking people if we could take pictures of their serial numbers and then enter them into the computer for the warranty work.  I met a lot of pretty nice people, and I also met some rude people.  I met some mean dogs and some extremely friendly dogs.  Overall, I was pretty on edge most of the day, but it all turned out fine.  After work, we immediately left to go to Marilyn's house.  She is a member of our church who was willing to give us supper.  She fed us very well with taco salad and then banana splits.  After supper, Christian and Leigha dro...

 Today was pantry day.  However, I had to start my day by running over to Bentley to retrieve Doug's bag, which he had forgotten the day before.  Then we headed over to the pantry.  After we dropped Jenni off, Doug and I went and did the pickups.  Sprouts gave us the least amount of food Doug had ever seen, and Trader Joe's gave us the most amount of food Doug had ever seen. It evens out then.  We got everything put away, and then I had a couple of burritos for lunch.  We got started, and it ran pretty smoothly.  After we were done, we packed up and headed back to the office.  Then I was able to head home for the day.  When I got home, I decided I was going to go pick up my bike before I found out our van was dead again.  I decided to put my new battery charger on it, and as I was getting it started, the power went out.  I thought I had managed to trip a breaker, but after further investigation, it turned out that a large part ...