Previously, I have blogged about Jim and Sharon (finally, I learned their names after they moved out), the people next door who pushed a junk vehicle into my yard, became verbally abusive when my son asked if they intended to leave it there or remove it, and then brandished a gun at another neighbor who attempted to rectify the situation.  State Troopers dealt with the gun situation, and reporting the abandoned vehicle to them enabled me to have it hauled away at state expense.

Jim and Sharon were squatting there on Grayhorse's property, without paying him anything, though they told neighbors they were buying the place -- neighbors who know Grayhorse and had been getting his end of the story in phone conversations.  They virtually denuded the land of trees, bulldozed Grayhorse's perennial herb gardens, left big heaps of trash and junk, and alienated nearby neighbors with loud music, bright yard lights, and barking dogs.  Before they moved in there, they had been "managing" a motel a block and a half away.  That matter is still in litigation as far as I know.  They might have been squatting there, too.  What I do know for a fact, because I observed it, is that they started demolishing part of the motel when they moved out, and used the lumber to repair and expand Grayhorse's cabin.

I also observed the traffic coming and going from their place.  Based on the volume and frequency, times of day and lengths of stay, as well as some of the vehicles I recognized there, I suspect that they were dealing some kind of drugs.  Based on things I found there after they left, I concluded that somebody, sometime, had been growing weed there, too.  But I'm getting ahead of my story here.

Early this year, the yard light and loud noise situations changed.  The dogs still barked whenever a car drove by or if one of us stepped outside our door, and whenever some other stimulus set them off.  On one occasion, Doug encountered Sharon on a trip to the mailbox and she went on and on to him with a paranoiac rant about how people were driving or walking past her house just to make her dogs bark.  What had changed was that there was no more loud amplified music during daylight hours, and at night when the yard lights were on they were accompanied by the noise from a 2-cycle engine.  I took that to mean that they were no longer using electrical power from the local co-op, but were generating their own electricity.  Further, I took that as an indication that they may have accumulated an unpaid utility bill.

Last summer, "moving sale" signs went up in their yard and up by the mailboxes along the highway.  Once, when we had stopped along that side of this corner lot to offload some water for the garden before proceeding on around the corner into our driveway, Jim limped over and engaged my son Doug in conversation as I waited in the car.  Doug reported that he'd been told the man was going Outside for emergency surgery and they were selling everything.  He specifically mentioned water purification equipment and a submersible pump, items that I assumed belonged to Grayhorse.

One afternoon, Doug and I walked out the garden path and crossed over into their yard to see if there was anything at the yard sale that we might be able to use.  The dogs barked wildly until we spoke to them, then they quieted.  First the man came out briefly, greeted us, said he could understand about my leaning on a dog house to rest after the walk, then he shuffled painfully back into the house after telling us to go ahead and look around.  The woman came out a little later, bringing a handful of bags for us to put our purchases into.  She said there was a lot more that they hadn't brought outside, "just ask."  I did mention a couple of things I was looking for, and she disappeared back into the house to bring back them and a lot more.

She was talking nonstop, fawning, quoting ridiculously low prices each time I asked (nothing was tagged), and offering to give me this or that item in which I showed interest.  I declined a few such offers of things that would just have been in my way, accepted some others, picked out enough cheap kitchen tools, fabric remnants, sheets, towels, etc,. to add up to about $10 at her low prices, and filled a couple of grocery bags with them.  I had kept a running total, and told her what it was.  She said to give her $2.00 and we'd be "straight."  Then she said she had a lot of clothes inside that would fit me, and offered to bring them to my house before she left.

As Doug  and I were walking back through our garden, I said, "I wonder what she's on."  Later, judging by the empty prescription bottles I found, I concluded that it could have been any one, two, or combination of 3 anti-anxiety drugs, and/or several illicit ones, too, I guess.  Again, I am getting ahead of myself.

One day, working in my yard, I noticed that someone was burning trash over in their yard.  It was a fat guy in bermuda shorts, someone I didn't recognize.  Some days later, I noticed some different stuff out in the yard sale area, including tools and electronic gear that I could use, so I approached the house and knocked, since no one came out.  Fat guy introduced himself as Greg, and said he was there to take care of the dogs.  Jim and Sharon were gone, and the canine population was down to 3, which coincidentally is the limit allowed by the land covenants in this subdivision.  When Jim and Sharon were there, they had 7 dogs.  They had gotten breeders to take back 2 chows and 2 huskies they had acquired from them previously, leaving only 3 old female Rottweiler mixes.

He pointed to a sign I'd overlooked. stuck under a jar on one of the tables.  It said, "take what you want and leave a donation."  That day, after accepting his invitation to come in and have a cup of tea, I gave him a few bucks and took home a couple of boxes of useful stuff.  He even loaded my stuff in his van and drove it around the corner for me.  We schmoozed and got acquainted.  He wanted to move into Grayhorse's cabin, but had been unable to get the power turned on, because of a large outstanding bill, without getting a letter from the owner.  Walt, the neighbor on his other side, had snubbed him when he introduced himself and said he was the dogs' caretaker.  Walt had been wanting to shoot those barking dogs for years.  Jim and Sharon had tethered the noisiest of them closer to Walt's house than to their own.

I explained some of that history to Greg, and phoned Walt for him, attempting to get Grayhorse's phone number for Greg.  Walt told me that the last time he had tried to call Grayhorse, the number was not in service.  Another neighbor later told me Grayhorse was running from the law.  I dunno about that -- Grayhorse, as far as I knew, was pretty straight-arrow.

The last time I saw Greg, he said he needed money to buy a pack of cigarettes, and told me that anyone who'd give him ten bucks could have whatever they wanted from the house and yard.  I gave him the $10.  He said that he had been in contact with Darla, the borough Animal Care officer, who was going to come out and impound the three old dogs, "in a few days."  Meanwhile, he was going to take his dog and go to Anchorage for an "appointment."  He asked me if I would feed the dogs until he got back, and showed me two 40-pound bags of dog food he said he'd gotten from Animal Care.  I agreed to feed the dogs while he was gone.

When I went back that evening to feed them, one of the big food bags was gone, and the other was nearly empty and had some moldy dog biscuits in the bag with the food.  I picked out the moldy stuff, fed the old girls, gave them fresh water, talked to them, scratched their ears, rubbed their bellies and started bonding with them.  Several days later, I called Animal Care and left a voice mail for Darla.  When she called me back, I learned more about Jim and Sharon, and the two of us pieced together a few things about Greg.  He had not even been Jim and Sharon's designated caretaker for the dogs.  They left after asking another neighbor to feed them temporarily.  Greg only knew Jim and Sharon from having stopped once at their yard sale.  He had discovered the dogs without food or water and moved into the empty cabin about the time I first saw him burning trash.

Darla told me she was powerless to impound the dogs without a warrant, and to get one she needed evidence of abuse or neglect, or a signed statement by the designated caretaker.  The man whom Jim and Sharon had designated had no interest in caring for the dogs, but wouldn't sign to have them impounded for fear of retribution from Jim.  Darla had had several recent phone conversations with Jim, in which he was verbally abusive and threatening violence against her if she impounded his (abandoned) dogs.  Rather than being in Seattle, WA, where he had reportedly gone for surgery, he was in Reno, NV, presumably for purposes of gambling, or possibly for running a scam of some sort.  Papers left behind appeared to imply that they had been involved in several scams in the recent past.

Now I guess I'm no longer getting ahead of my story.  To cut to the chase:  I kept feeding and paying attention to the old dogs until Darla somehow managed to get her warrant despite the lack of abuse/neglect or the signature of a caretaker.  She showed up one day with a Trooper and took them away.  For a while, not having a dog bark every time I stepped out my door was novel and noticeable, but I've gotten used to it.

Having been invited into the cabin by Greg and having paid him the $10 he asked, in addition to having been offered a bunch of free clothing by Sharon, I started scrounging in earnest.  Being the person I am, I did not hesitate to snoop while I scrounged.  I learned that in addition to being abominable neighbors, scofflaws and freeloaders, Jim and Sharon were apparently involved in insurance and welfare fraud.  Empty prescription bottles revealed that both of them used a lot of psychoactive drugs.  Full or partially full bottles, boxes and tubes revealed that they filled a lot of prescriptions for antibiotics, anti-fungals and other drugs that they then did not use.  An enigmatic big bag of soap bars, apparently used just once each before being dropped into the bag, disclosed a mystery about which I have evolved several possible solutions and no final conclusion.

Many of the things I found there were identifiable as having belonged to Grayhorse or his lady, Kim.  The kitchen held two obviously disparate collections of foodstuffs.  Kim's were heavy in the "from-scratch" ingredients, while the other included many quick mixes.  Other things I found in the cabin had been stolen from me, from my old place across the highway at Elvenhurst.  This might be evidence that Jim and/or Sharon had been among the thieves/vandals who ravaged my old home, or it might be evidence that the actual thieves included someone else who had lived in Grayhorse's cabin, or one or both of the Flores brothers who had run the motel before Jim and Sharon moved into it.  One Flores had gone to jail and the other had died suddenly, and many items recognizable as theirs, some with their names on them, were among the things left in the cabin next door.

How my stuff ended up in Grayhorse's cabin, I don't know.  I have it back now, and more.  I now have a hacksaw and long-handled limb-lopping pruner which have already seen productive use in my workshop and yard.  Hardware aplenty were there and sorting it, organizing it, will give me productive ways to pass cold winter days in the warmth on my new upper bunk.  Some of the expensive exotic plant foods I bought from Greg on the cheap are going to enhance my indoor and outdoor gardens in times to come.  Possibilities are endless.

P.S.  Maybe I'm back to blogging regularly.  That's how it feels.  I have so many stories, so much old news to catch up with, and even some memoirs to write down now that they have recurred to my mind.  I have thought often of Xanga friends, and happily anticipate renewing our acquaintance.  Be seein' ya!