Good morning to you! It is November 1st, 2016. There are only 60 days left in this year. Wow! That is hard to believe in some ways and in other ways it seems like this has been a waaaay too long of a year; especially when I think of all of the election stuff that we have had to deal with this year. A week from today the nation will elect a new president. As bad as it has been so far --- I can't imagine how nasty it is going to get this week. I'm very ashamed of the picture that we the American people have painted to the rest of the world about our politics. There are 321 million people in this country and we have two of the nastiest, most corrupt people possible to chose from as our elected leaders.

This seems to be the day of departure; --- at least in terms of leaves falling from my trees. It almost looks like it is snowing when the breeze picks up. There will be a lot of raking to do this week again. And I'll need to walk the roof line and blow off the gutters. It is supposed to rain (finally) on Thursday, and I want to blow the gutters out before the leaves get all wet and matted down.

Halloween was fun. I found the mask that I have used forever yesterday --- after we went and bought new ones of course. So once again I put on my costume and sat at the bottom of the drive way on my John Deere lawnmower with my basket full of candy. I'd venture to say that I had 200 plus trick or treaters. They came in two waves. Early, before dark, moms and dads brought the little ones out. There were a lot of princesses, and star wars  characters, and minions and other cute costumes. They are so adorable and I don't mess with them or try to scar them. They get the "friendly version" of The Monkey. Come dusk, the second wave starts coming out. They are what I call the double digit crew, meaning ages 10 - 15. They normally come in groups of three or four and are full of bravado from the boys and girl giggles and laughter from the girls. This is the group I mess with. I sit totally still and never say a word  so they can't tell "is it real or is it fake". They find out when they reach for the candy and I suddenly move. The screams can be heard to the delight of the watching neighbors and occassional parents that are accompanying them. But --- I must say that all of my kids were polite and they only would take one or two pieces of candy and then say thank you. It was refreshing to see.

This will be a confusing week. Yesterday was a holiday but not really a holiday. Julie and Jim came over on Sunday afternoon and stayed over until yesterday afternoon instead of their Saturday and Sunday arrival and departure. So, Monday seemed like Sunday, except I didn't have church; and today seems like Monday. Yep, it is going to be a confusing week.

I hope your week will be less confusing and I hope your week is full of blessings. Take time to pray for our nation and please don't skip out of voting. Regardless of how disgusted we might be with the campaign --- voting is a right and a privilege not afforded to much of the world. Pray and vote. Peace.