So, last week I had oodles of company. It was fabulous. My dearest friend came to stay with her daughter for four days, her boyfriend and his daughter came for one day, and at the end of the week she returned with her two sons as well. The week was filled with children playing, laughter abound and of course, you can’t have a girl night without a few tears over heartfelt conversations. It was a very blessed week indeed. Then on Sunday, another old and dear friend texted and said she was in WI from Oklahoma (I don’t know the abbreviation for that right off the top of my head, I think it’s OK but not going to risk it….remember that comment earlier….for being highly educated I’m not all that smart….anyway….(SQUIRREL)). So on Sunday had another wonderful day of hanging with an old friend while Lane played with her young son.
Now you may remember one of my biggest lessons of life….my house may be messy but it WILL always smell good and I rely on others to tell me if it doesn’t. My friend Kristy, who stayed here for most of the week, swore to me my house did not smell like cat pee. (When I got the cat, from the humane society, I told them carpet peeing was a deal breaker and if she did it, she would be returned). I was relieved to know that….I have this phobia of getting too used to the smell of my home that I might miss it. Last night however, my neighbor was over and he went down to the lower level and came back up and said your house smells like cat pee. I was like WHAT? NO WAY. He said, don’t get mad at me…but it does down stairs. I immediately ran down…tried and tried to smell it. Sometimes I think I can get a whiff of it but everyone kept assuring me I was crazy and my husband can’t smell…(allergies). Well, that set my mind in motion and I could hardly fall asleep last night. So yes, today, my morning was doing nothing but cleaning and shampooing the rugs downstairs with bleach water. I will NOT have a house that smells of cat pee.
As I was shampooing away with my best friend in the world the Hoover Carpet Shampooer, I remembered the last time I shampooed the rug down here and realized it was a story that must be shared.
It starts with Ruby. Now Ruby was the dog I waited my whole life for…I thought. I have always wanted a Newfoundland and so the time came when I decided I was just going to get one, sick of waiting, dreaming…wanting. I did my research on them, learned they were easy to train, great family dogs and loved water…and loved their masters and families so much that they also were known for their ability and instinct to be water rescue dogs. I had to have one, so I paid the big bucks and found my Ruby. She was the cutest 12 week old puppy I had ever seen in my life…loved her to death…for….about …. three days. Then the love/hate relationship began.
First, Ruby was NOT easy to train….two years later she still was not housebroken. She was on tiled floor but the minute she hit carpet…bam she peed, and I do believe I had the only, THE ONLY Newfoundland who hated and was afraid of water. She was not going to rescue me if I was drowning…she would say sorry missy, you’re on your own. And I don’t even believe for one second she loved me. No, in fact that dog hated me. She lived to torment me. One day, she came bounding in the house as Newfs do, and jumped right on top of my bed and peed. ON MY BED. Do you have any idea how much pee comes out of a Newf? A heck of a lot. It was like Kusel Lake in the middle of my bed. Oh was I mad, and good thing my husband was not home or she might not have lived through the day. So, Ruby was locked, again, in the entry way of my home while I shampooed my bed with my carpet shampooer. Everything was cleaned up and life was back on track again, or so I thought. However, Ruby was mad. She was so mad at me for locking her in the entryway that while my shampooer, my favorite of all household appliances, was sitting just on the opposite side of the gate, Ruby, ate the cord off of it. Yes, yes she did…not just chewed a little split in it like some dogs do. The cord was in two pieces and I’m sure some of it was missing. I, of course, immediately was not only angry but panicked at the thought of no carpet shampooer.
My dear husband however planned to fix it (which made me just a little nervous)….off to the hardware store we went and he came out with a nice shiny knew end for the cord. I looked in the bag and I looked at him and immediately asked, ARE YOU CRAZY? He looked at me like I was of course and said why? I said you are just going to put a new end on the cord that is now 6 inches long? How in the world is that even going to work…how am I supposed to shampoo with THAT? He just shook his head and stated….relax…you will see in his patient, slightly exasperated way. He put the end on the six inch cord left on the shampooer and then (insert that comment again about my education) connected a heavy duty extension cord to the end of it. HOLY COW, I could shampoo from one end of the house to the other and never change plug ins. I was ecstatic.
SO, it brings me to the day I was shampooing the carpet in our lower level (because Ruby peed on it). I was shampooing along….not even sure what was filling my head but I was feeling rather accomplished….until the shampooer stopped working. Just shut right off. I was like WHAT???? Then I noticed…there was no power in the downstairs at all. Then I noticed…I WAS ON FIRE. My shirt was. I have been on fire now a few times in my life and they are all due to the same kind of crap that happens to me and only me. So I of course started to do the fire dance to get my sweater put out. Then off to see why our power had gone out…I still did not put two and two together…(Hey, it was a matter of about 10 seconds tops at least). The upstairs had power…downstairs did not….breaker box. Of course, the breaker was shut off. WHAT THE HECK….as of that moment, nothing blew a breaker in our house except for when I made baked potatoes in the microwave. (Long story…..just let it go). It was when I was turning the breaker on I felt something fall past my arm.It was my gold necklace. The one my husband gave me almost 11 years ago now….beautiful gold and diamond necklace that I never took off. It was fried in half. HOW THE HECK DID THIS HAPPEN???? I go back to investigate.
Well here is what happened:
The cord to the shampooer was now TOO long and so I began to wrap the excess around my shoulders so I did not shampoo them. Where the extension cord was connected to the tiny cord there was a gap and the prongs were just a little bit visible. My necklace….kept getting into the gap and I’m sure if I could hear better I may have heard the sparking…it must have gone on for quite some time because I had the rug almost finished when I realized I was on fire. Well, one spark too many and there must have been a power surge and flames that took hold of my sweater and simultaneously blew the breaker and started me on fire. Seriously, I know no other person this stuff happens too. I try to be cool, I try to be normal, I really do….but it is no longer anything I even try to be anymore because I ….AM…..A…..DORK.
It took me a long time to accept my dorkhood. There was the time, I was at the gas station with my big boat of a Crown Victoria and a little gaggle of football players from the college standing outside. I was going to walk past them so cool like….and get my business there done and walk past them again all cool like. That was impossible to do after I left my car running, forgot to put it into park and was chasing it through the gas station parking lot. I left, never even bothering to go in for what I stopped for in the first place. And, there was the day, I pulled into my apartment building and the cute landscaper guys out working in the hot rainy day….shirts off….I was going to walk past them gracefully and make sure I was noticed. Oh I was noticed all right…..I got out of my car….put up my umbrella and walked into the hallway of my apartment and went to put my umbrella down and immediately a bucket of water was dumped on my head. WHAT??? I put my umbrella up but the wind whipped it and flipped it upside down…so as I’m walking all cool like past the landscapers, my umbrella is not protecting me from rain at all…it is filling with water. (Yes…it was always a little difficult for me to get a date….)
Somehow, I did manage to snag a husband along the way…and yes, he shakes his head more often than I would like to admit and says WHY ME. I am pretty sure my dad is secretly paying him behind the scenes to keep me so that I don’t end up back home living with him. It’s happened a few times too.
So I am now trying to slow down, take notice of my surroundings and what I am doing, it is going to save my life someday….especially in an empty room all by myself with the carpet shampooer.
Oh, and by the way, Kristy if you read this….I THOUGHT YOU DID NOT SMELL CAT PEE??!?!!??
