Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Bah Humbug Indeed

You will have to excuse me if my feelings for this particular time of year are slightly skewed to the negative. It has been quite the weekend.

The bathroom plumbing went from draining to thinking about draining over the course of November. I did do the whole Draino bit but that didn't seem to alleviate the problem. On the 2nd, I took a shower in preparation for the office Christmas dinner and it seemed the "thinking about draining" had gone to "Oooh shiny! You want me to do what now?" I grabbed the plunger and plunged away and heard, coming from the basement, dripdripdripdripdripdrip.

Cripes. There was a leak. It seemed to be at the joint where the tub meets the plumbing. Just what I need.

The boss was gone all of last week; meetings and sales calls and all sorts of things; so my ability to take time off to deal with the bathroom was limited. I washed up in the kitchen, late at night, under the cover of darkness, washing one half of my body one day and the other half another day. You read the post about that. Finally, I said, no more. This is kind of a quality of life issue here. When you can't even use your sink because it backs up into the tub, it's gotta be fixed. So, last Friday, I made the appointment for the plumber to come on Monday. I have the days off that I can use and my boss said I really need to take them. I took the whole day.

I go home on Friday and decide I will relax by playing WOW. The Mac won't boot up. Frantic text messages with friends seemed to determine that my hard drive is dying a very slow death. It chose Friday to stop working properly, would not boot up at all.

I sat in my recliner and just cried. I try, I really do, to provide for myself, to save for the rainy days that come up. I had just stuff a bunch of cash into my meager savings account. I was feeling very proud of myself. Poof. It's gone. Karma is making sure I don't feel too smug? I promise I wasn't. I was just feeling good about being able to have that little extra. (sigh)

So, the weekend was filled with cleaning, sorting, crafting, watching TV and worrying...and worrying. I kept telling myself there was nothing I could do about the situation. It is what it is and worrying or fretting about things won't make it any better. There goes the trip to Iowa, assuming I could have the girls cared for. The money I would have used for gas has gone down the drain, figuratively. I'm going to need cat food before the paycheck comes. If it's a choice between gas and groceries, well, you can guess which one I'm going to choose.

Gratitude. Gratitude. Gratitude.

If ever there was a time when I needed to practice gratitude, this is it. I have a house and heat and food and things to do that don't involve the Internet. I can come into the office and do my banking and clean out my email during the weekend, if I feel the need. It's not like I'm completely cut off. After the plumber left on Monday, I finished cleaning the kitchen and sweeping the bathroom and kitchen floors. I can now wash them. There was much good accomplished yesterday. The girls are thrilled that I'm in the living room and not in the office. Man, TV is really a vast wasteland and I've not missed anything great, although that PBS special on racoons was very interesting.

Gratitude.

It's tough to see beyond the dollar signs going out your door. It's tough to not fall into the "Oh woe is me" trap. This is just a temporary blip in life. Yeah, I sometimes feel like all I do is go from pothole to pothole but it's okay. I'll make it through.

Beverage:  water

Deb

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