The Spiderweb Patrol

On Friday, NI gave the day off to anyone who went and did volunteer work on that day. I <3 NI.

A group of 6 of us were assigned to Lyons Gardens Assisted Living in East Austin - off Pleasant Valley Rd. This is really quite a scary neighborhood so I wasn't sure what to expect as I was driving up. As I got within a block or so, I saw these cute little walkup townhomes and thought to myself - well those are cute - I am glad someone built those here. Well, it turns out - that was Lyons Gardens! It's an apartment complex for low income seniors - 58 units - built about 4 years ago.

We were all assigned different jobs from their "job jar." Things like hanging pictures, hanging curtains, flipping mattresses, and the benign sounding "sweep spiderwebs from the stairwells."

4 of us were assigned to the spiderweb job. They gave us telescoping brooms and sent us on our way. So between 10 and 3 (with 30 minutes off for lunch), I swept spiderwebs, spiders, spider eggs, and other spider stuff from stairwells and hallway ceilings of this place. It was a really satisfying job, because it made such a noticeable different - and a few of the residents even came out to thank us (probably because I banged my broom against their door). So I was feeling pretty smug about all my hard work and good deed for the day.

And then I saw what the other volunteers from NI did: You used jackhammers????

I will not be complaining about some spider webs on my shirt or my sore neck.