An eventful last few days!!

Newly discovered leaks in my St Paul roof, Injured kitty paws. riots in Agra, car accidents, success finding ONE tailor so far...

Our poor renter, discovered a leak looking like it may come from the roof from the storms a few weeks ago. Wish ALL of us luck please!! She has been great about helping us deal with all this so far away.

My little Alex kitty has had a little limp. We were hoping for it to improve, but no luck so he went to the vet to discover that Nikita probably bit him during their usual tussles and now it is infected… though the puncture healed quickly so it is hard to find. So, Jeff, the BEST pet sitter in the WORLD (not even complaining about Alex digging his claws in to him during the vet cramming a pill down Alex’s throat… A TOTAL TROOPER!!) is getting the joys of administering drops and holding Alex’s paw with a hot wet cloth each day for a while.

Agra, where we are supposed to go this weekend, had a bit of a riot yesterday. Looks like a truck hitting a biker who was part of a Muslim group coming back from a pilgrimage turned in to random people rioting, attacking cars and police. There was escalation attempts trying to make it a religious issue, but in reality, it looks like that wasn’t the case. So, roads to Agra are blocked. Hopefully things will clear up by tomorrow. TOTALLY unfortunate. A child died from a stray bullet and over 50 hurt. The Taj itself is open, it is just a matter of road blacks or “Curfews”. We will see about things tonight and figure out if we need to change plans.

India is a complex place. Can be very peaceful, but when something breaks, it can get out of control and really bad quickly… and no real idea of what and where will set things off.

The last but TOTALLY not least or our tragic tails. On Joel’s way home last night our driver ran in to a cement road block. Not sure what actually happened. Probably a miscalculation when turning the corner? Looked away for a split second? Joel thinks they were going at a pretty good speed but doesn’t remember much besides thinking that it was getting a bit close and then wham. He was a bit sore when he got home but seems to be fine today, just a bit tired. The impact was hard, but the driver was fine, he was wearing his seatbelt, Joel was not, and not really sure if he was thrown against anything.

The front of the car was smooshed a bit.

LUCKILY one of the other drivers Moses and 3 other co-workers HAPPENED to be going out to dinner and HAPPENED to see the car as they drove by. Moses stopped and Rajpal said it was just a flat tire… which surprised Joel a bit as he thought it was more impact then that. Luckily. Ramya, one of the three passengers called Joel on his cell and asked if he would like a lift home which was SO wonderful as Joel figured the 10 minutes Rajpal thought it would be was PROBABLY underestimating a bit. So, Kind of freaky. We weren’t sure if our driver would still have a job, but he showed up this morning…
SCARY!! But everyone is OK thank goodness.

I found a shop with a tailor that works with them. SO, I met with him last night and have 3 Kurtis/ladies shirts. SO, next week I should have that to share. I’m excited!! I still need to find one that I can bring material I already own to. And want to see about looking at different designs. This guy looked at the material and drew me pictures of what he thought he should make and asked me for preferences. I figured I’d run with it and see what happens.

That’s it for now. Hopefully we’ll have Taj pics in a few days!

Happy Labor Day weekend all!

Judy and Joel