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Where is the water, mama?

So, how can a week be awesome? Here's how:

1. It's Tuesday of Dead Week, with 3 finals looming and 2/3 of a 30 page writing project not yet actually in existence.

2. You just made a really ripping turkey soup, all mire poix and jalepeno and barley just itching to tear it up.

3. You just got cable again on Monday, and Colbert Report is on.

4. As you sit down to eat, you hear a buzzing, crackling sound from the kitchen.

5. Within minutes, one of the electrical outlets in the kitchen is emitting acrid rubbery smoke.

6. Panicked, you run out to the fuse box and flip any switch that'll cut power to that outlet.

7. The first one you find also happens to cut power to everything but the stove and the water heater.

8. Did I mention it was well after dark?

9. Cursing your ass luck, you fumble in the dark to find a less complete circuit breaker, unaided by the gibberish scribbled in the fuse box, but your efforts only result in more smoke and a power surge.

10. Leaving the power off, you open up the suspect outlet and discover a nightmare cave of cobwebs, well-entrenched rust, and copious rainwater trickling onto open electrical points. We got the results back from the lab, and we think we know what the problem is.

11. You stand there in the dark, making simple calculations: it is unsafe to be in this house with the power turned on, and impossible with the power turned off.

12. The result, arrived at at 8:30PM, is: empty the fridge, dump tasty perishables at a cousin's house, pack up sundry essentials and all four pets, shut down the house, and flee 135 miles north to the in-laws' place.

13. Try, so far in vain, to contact landlord.

14. Deal with your ass-pile of studying sometime later, and be glad your first final is on the 7th. (Yes, infamy and all of that.)

15. And to top it off, on the way up, a McDonald's in Albany served me a hamburger into which they must have accidentally spilled an entire salt shaker.

Been refugees since Tuesday, but today, good news: I drove down here and was able to isolate a smaller power circuit dealing with the problem area, and leaving that one off, I have restored power to 80% of the house, including such vital areas as the heating, fridge, stove, water heater, microwave, and laundry. But some areas remain impassable and without power. It's like a one-house natural disaster up in here. The outside wall of the kitchen, and all of the outlets in the living room, are our own private Lower Ninth Ward.

So, this explains my, FLOGette's, and Zuma's absence if anyone was wondering. Zuma was also out of town last Friday for Thanksgiving. Blogging pales in comparison to turkey giblets and the bits of stuffing that roll off the counter.

Posted by FLOG at December 3, 2005 11:35 AM