Journal: August 10. Porch dilemnas. Vinyl ceiling expedition.

The vinyl ceiling siding in Stillwater!

Another hot day. George arrives later than usual because of delay in lumber delivery. As we wait for the wood, George suggests that we re-think plans to keep wooden porch ceiling as there is too much wreckage, rot and just poor work in all that roofing. He recommends a vinyl material that mimics wood -and offers to take me to a house (that has the glacier blue siding I like as a bonus) so I can see the vinyl in person. He knows that although I do not want a plastic house--my finances make it the only viable alternative--and he also knows that with my aging vision--from a distance the plastic is a good enough stand-in for wood-to trick most of us. And, of course, there is always the compelling no-maintenance argument. Most people (including, according to my sporadic research, the siding man for "This Old House") use vinyl siding to free them from the travails of house painting forever.

The truck from Blue Ridge lumber yard in Stillwater, arrives before ten with its load of a very long beam as well as some serious columns.

Logan arrives with plans to stay for many hours--he'll begin by removing the stump he left near the lake and move into straightening out the drainage on the patio. Johnny will continue getting rid of rotten roof wood and George and I head out to Stillwater for my studies in plastic.

As I'm sure George knew, once I saw the ceiling material, there was no point in arguing. Although I'd brought my camera, I'd left it in the car--about six feet away. In the name of efficiency, I used my clever phone which is in my hand a good deal of the time to take many pictures of the glacier blue siding, the deep red doors and the ceiling.

The pictures were all curiously colorless. Looking back through other recent photos, I noticed that many of them shared this quality. Perhaps good for art, but not so great for color identification. I knew I must have re-set some camera function, but it was all a bit of a mystery.

Eventually, after pushing many buttons, I discovered that I had somehow chosen a "sepia" option. This explains the mushroom picture of August 8th, as well as the picture of Dave mowing.

Sepia as it may be, the picture is an accurate enough depiction of the joys of vinyl. One more step into my plastic universe.