Well DONE!

The well is now officially "in"! It has been fitted and cemented and capped and logged and reported -- and all we have to show for that heap o' mishegas is an unassuming bit of pipe coming out of the ground.

Michael with that all-important little pipe.

The drillers also finished up with the "abandonment" of the first hole, and I was glad to see that it will not have any kind of above ground component to forever remind me of that colossal mistake. It is all filled and cemented in, but the cement is a bit below ground level, so once the dirt is scraped back over it, you will never know it was there. However, in case future generations should stumble upon it, I decided to scratch a little message on it, as you see here:

A cryptic little note for future archeologists.

Now, let's get this damn thing buried so I can forget about it!

As for what comes next, we got the well report in to the building department, and they are doing their best to rush through our official building permit, but they are temporarily short staffed, so what would normally take them only a few days could take up to two weeks. They know we can't afford that kind of delay, so they very kindly gave us a verbal okay to go ahead and do the foundation work, so we are trying to spin that up. We still need the excavation guy to do a bit more before any cement work can be done, but we hope that will all move along briskly. In reality, I think nothing to do with construction moves along briskly, but we must continue to hope. The guys in the building department are great, at least, and that certainly helps.

For those of you who are also tuning in for the Lido saga, I did his second re-wrapping yesterday, and the wounds were significantly less goopy, so that is good. Still some swelling, but the vet said that everything I have been seeing is fully to be expected, so nothing appears to be going awry with his recovery -- touch wood. 

The medial side of Lido's leg.

As of last night, Lido is done his course of antibiotics, for which I am grateful, because not only did it mean an extra trip to the barn each day, but Lido was starting to take a hike any time I tried to come near him with his halter, as he knew very well that I was going to squirt yucky stuff in his mouth. I had to start bribing him with some of Michael's chocolate chip cookies or I would never have been able to catch him. I will have to make a point of catching him and only doing nice things with him for a while to undo that association in his little blond mind.

Overall, I must say that I have been exceptionally impressed with how cooperative and patient Lido has been with all of this, as besides walking away from the halter, he never fought me at all. Stood like a trooper for the laborious, multi-layer wrapping, and took his meds like a man, er, horse, which was a great relief to me, as I would not have been physically able to struggle with him in my current state of post-surgical recovery. I know very well that had it been Gryphon who needed blechy oral meds twice a day, it would have been a full-on war, and I would have had to get Michael to do it.

I will let you all know how things go with getting the foundation work started...more soon, I hope!  : )