Good humor makes all things possible.
-Charles Schultz-

With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come.
-Shakespeare-The Merchant of Venice-

Thursday, April 14, 2011

I totally get it

Its the one on the right

So, a little background.  Last week A and I went to Reno, where my sister lives.  All five siblings, my mom, and a few other relatives gathered for the annual ski n' fabulous food fiesta.  It was wonderful, but because I have to balance the bitter and the sweet, this morning I stepped out into what had been my garage but was now a bayou.  Water squished into my socks and I instantly determined that my day was going in a different direction than originally envisioned.  I saw an alligator.  My inclination was to take a shower right away because it was conceivable that there wouldn't be hot water for long.

But I really needed a plan.

Obstacle!

Calling on my homeowner/McGyver heritage, I made a funnel out of a plastic bottle so the drooling water went into a bucket instead of soaking the plywood wall and the rug.  That bought me a little time.

I had to establish where the water was coming from.  Determine how fast it was coming.  Notify A who has more tools and fewer plumbing nightmares than I do. Go online and see what Ask.com thinks the problem is and what to do about it.  Drag the sopping rug (a hand-me-down 5x7 that substitutes for a doormat, which is only practical when dry) out onto the sunny driveway to drain.  Make and consume coffee.  Wonder if I have a real cold or just rampant allergies like everyone else in this county.  Worry about what to do if it IS my ten-year-old water heater. Could I afford a new one? What about tankless?  Weigh my fears about exploding water heaters that rocket up through two floors and a roof, which appeared on Mythbusters as recently as LAST NIGHT.  Remember (from journalism class in eighth grade)  to ask Where, Who, What, Worry,  Wonder, and Weigh.)  I forgot When! It might have started while I was in Reno and been dribbling away quietly for days...But I think it must have only been a night or two.  Just long enough to swamp a big carpet.

Ask.com  cheerfully explained what to do, emphasizing how simple the solutions were.  It also said that sometimes a water heater could explode or scald me or render me penniless, but not always. So A and I gently drained and flushed the tank.  A tapped on some things with a hammer. We carefully loosened and tightened and squirted WD40 and made sure everything looked like the diagram only better.  And now it's out there, full and warm and dry.

Mocking me.

Perhaps because of the cold/allergies, I should feel triumphant, but I'm discouraged.  My worldly goods are crumbling; wearing out; wearing through.  My body gets lumpier and  slower.   I try to eat eleven hundred calories a day and I'm hungry from dawn until  Jay Leno.  I don't have a job and can't remember how to do anything anyway.

I have this. Except instead of being itchy, I'm wheezy.  

But tomorrow, as Scarlett insisted, is another day.  I have projects enough to last through infinity.  Someday, eating like a refugee will chisel off ten pounds gained from menopause topped with eight years of irregular meals and perpetual weariness.  Good things are coming, even if I don't know when.
Don't look for me.  I don't ski.  I eat.

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