The power was on when we woke up this morning even though it had been off several times during the night. The power went off again this morning at 8:00 and was off until almost 2:00 this afternoon. Fortunately, we decided to take advantage of the power being on this morning and check the transfer water pump for leaks. We are happy to report that we found no leaks in the new connections but we found a small leak in the pipe that connects to the lower poly tank. Once we drain that tank, we will be able to get someone to come and fix it for us. It appears to me that the seal is bad but Steve thinks the water is leaking past the threads in the connection. Whatever be the case we will have to address that leak sooner than later! We were able to pump water into the overhead tank and I got all the laundry washed!
I spent several hours this morning trying to justify the check book that Zorash and Mr. Iddrisu use when we are gone. It is sort of like an emergency fund so they have access to money without going to Tamale to get it. Mr. Iddrisu had not written down any of the entries for any of the checks that they had written. He wrote the money amount but not what it was for. We noticed the problem when we wanted to write a check for cash this morning. Mr. Iddrisu brought the check book to us and said that there was a problem with the check book. He said that when he did the calculations there was not enough money in the account to cover the checks that were written and that the check book was in a negative state! Not a good thing! He said the bank had cashed all the checks. I told him it was probably a subtraction problem and that we would sit down and find it. This is when I realized that they had not been recording what the money had been spent on. We keep a written running total of what is supposed to be in the bank so that we have some idea of how much money they have available. I cross checked my books with theirs and quickly found out that they had not entered a 77,000 Cedi deposit! No wonder they were in the hole! We then crosschecked the withdrawals and wrote out receipts for each of them. Hence the reason it took us so long to get the books justified.
After we fixed the bookkeeping problem, we sent Mr. Iddrisu to the bank to make the withdrawal and to pay the taxes.
When the electricity came on this afternoon, we called Zorash and she went with me to the grinding mill to grind the grains we roasted on Saturday and Sunday into weaning mix cereal for the babies. While we were out, we went to visit the lady who sells fabric seconds. She did not have anything I was interested in for myself but I bought a piece of fabric for a shirt for a friend.
We also need peanut oil; Zorash’s neighbor roasts peanuts and makes oil. I gave Zorash my oil container and she is going to bring me a gallon tomorrow when she comes to work! The oil is wonderful; it has not been refined and it smells just like roasted peanuts!
Take care and have a great Labor Day Holiday!
In HIS Service,
Steve, Kandie and Skeeter
The Monkeyshines
Well, I am highly insulted! The parents were so busy with Mr. Iddrisu and that check book that I had to stay in my condo until just before lunch! It is ridiculous that I have to suffer because Mr. Iddrisu does not know how to add and subtract. He tried to tell Mom that the reason there were mistakes was because of the new calculator that they gave him! He said the calculator was no good; it worked but it was not correct! What! Even a monkey could have come up with a better excuse than that! Sounds like an “operational error” to me! Needless to say, that due to his incompetence (Mom says that does not sound nice; I should say because of his mistakes) the end result is all the same! I was neglected, forgotten and had to pay the price! NOT HAPPY! NOT ONE LITTLE BIT!
After the failed start this morning my afternoon was perfect! I drank 3 bottles; Dad caught me a butterfly (it was black with white spots; I pulled off the wings and ate the rest; it was a very nice snack); the parents had Banku (fermented corn dough balls) for lunch and they saved some for me and a spider jumped on Mom and she called, “Spider, spider, Skeeter come quick. I found a spider”! “Spider” is one of the words I know so whenever Mom says, “spider” I come running! What a wonderful afternoon!
Hope your afternoon was as tasty as mine was!
Love, Skeeter
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