Hi from Homelessville! Well, I take that back, we're not homeless. We're at my parents' house where we each have our own bathroom and a fridge full of food we didn't have to pay for (holla!). But we're not in our house, because it's an igloo. So technically, homeless. (Sort of. Not really.)
Let me back up.
Saturday, 11am. Workout complete, coffee in hand, we return to the house in anticipation of some play time, some nap time, some pizza ordering time, and some football time.
Saturday, 11:01am. I'm like "WHY IS MY HOUSE FROZEN SOLID?"
Saturday, 11:30am. It's determined there heater is not working. At all.
Saturday, 12:30pm. J pulls some strings and gets a heating company to our house.
Saturday, 1:30pm. Heating guy leaves. I say, "all fixed?" He says, "all fixed."
Saturday, 3:00pm. We wake from our nap. (Yes, I napped, NO SLEEP AT NIGHT EVER.) I wonder why there's an icicle dangling off the end of my nose.
Saturday, 3:10pm. Oh goody, no heat. Again.
Saturday, 4:00pm. Kids and I huddle in my bedroom, wearing hats and pretending we're camping. I try to pretend this is fun, not really fooling anyone. Vivi tells me every ten seconds that her face/fingers/elbow is cold.
Saturday, 5:30pm. Heating guy leaves. I say, "all fixed?" He says, "all fixed."
Saturday, 6:00pm. We finish our pizza dinner, get ready to pile onto the couch for the Packer game, and I think "huh....I'm chilly."
Saturday, 6:01pm. It's determined the heat IS NOT WORKING AGAIN. Foul language, foot stomping, etc.
Saturday, 6:15pm. J spends 45 minutes in the (frigid) garage on the phone with heating guy #1 attempting to solve the problem.
Saturday, 8:00pm. Heating Guy #2 comes over, one who specializes in our (stupid idiot) furnace brand. Collects my left kidney as payment for a late night, freezing cold, mid-football playoff game visit.
Saturday, 8:15pm. We start up space heaters in our bedrooms.
Saturday, 8:17pm. Space heaters blow fuses. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.
Saturday, 8:40pm. Operation Space Heaters deemed an utter failure.
Saturday, 8:45pm. Anderson's stealing glances my way, wondering if I realize bedtime has come and gone and he's still sitting in my bedroom under a blanket playing iPad. Vivi's wandering around the house in an exhausted stupor saying things like "my princess won't eat her soup!" and "Chester has one eye!" I'm losing hope, starting to pack suitcases.
Saturday, 9:00pm. It's determined the heat will not be fixed. Like, ever.
Saturday, 9:30pm. We're in the loaded down Suburban, inching out of the driveway, bone tired. J, me, three up-too-late children, one very excited dog (CAR! OMG! GOING! SOMEWHERRRRE!), a rock and play, two suitcases, and five other random bags of miscellaneous crap. And two Dream Lights! OMG DON'T FORGET THE DREAM LIGHTS! We arrive at the ranch. Mommo's away, but Grandpa waits up and welcomes us and even though I'm 31.75 years old, it's comforting to pull into a driveway in the dark of night and see, inside the dimly lit house, my papa by the window waiting up for me. And my tribe. And our dog he doesn't exactly love. And all our crap. Poor, poor papa.
Sunday, late day. We go check on the house. The space heaters are running (not blowing fuses since they're the only electrical item in use) to ensure the pipes don't freeze (the water's shut off, too) and I'm paranoid all the livelong day about these space heaters running in our house. So, we go to check things out. And feed the kitties, who are playing a fun little game of "who can sit the closest to the space heater without lighting oneself on fire." The kids feel the house is a bit chilly, whine for the entire thirty minute stay. Okay, me too.
Monday, mid day. It comes to light that there's an issue with our propane gas tank (read: it's magically empty of the $800 of fuel we put into it last month). People, we did NOT use $800 of fuel in one month. Sorry, we just didn't. Our house is cold. We wear Uggs inside. We only run the heat in the kids' rooms at night, and even those rooms are only heated to about 68. ANDPLUSALSO, I signed up with the fuel company to do some auto-fill thing where they check our tank whenever they're in the neighborhood (which is ALWAYS, I SEEEEEEE YOU!) But they did not. And magically (read: SOMETHING IS VERY FISHY HERE), our $800 of fuel is gone. So is our furnace really broke? I mean, NOW it's freaking broke, there are pieces missing and such, but was it broke in the first place? Or was it out of gas because the heating company is a joke and also didn't do their JOBS and make sure we had, oh, IDK, GAS? Andplusalso, is this not Heating Guy 101: First Check That There's Gas? I hit the roof. HIT. THE. ROOF. There was crying, and lamenting of the bills incurred, and cussing out of the gas company fools, and other such very-helpful things. I might've cried. LIKE A LOT. And maybe drank a beer before 5:00pm.
Tuesday, 8:00am. Preschool time! Thank you, thank you, for preschool. Except turns out when you park your car outside in the mountains in January and don't move it or start it for a day and a half? Your windshield looks like this:
Supposedly, everything will be fixed today and we're going home, but my husband is ignoring my increasingly anxious texts requesting a status update, so I'm not exactly packing up the suitcases and vacuuming up my dog's hair just yet. Update, the gas company hasn't even been over yet, and nothing can be done with the heater until the gas thing is done, so OMG WE'RE GOING TO GO HOME NEVER.
**Wednesday update: we did not go home yesterday. By late evening, everything was working again, but the 40-50 degree house was going to take some time to warm to acceptable sleeping temperatures. Instead, I spent the evening watching 20/20 and eating ice cream with my dad. Win.**
Nobody needed to know all that. It's that whole "blog as free therapy" thing, you know? I feel better, so much better, nowwwwwwwww. (Oh yeah, we've also watched Doc McStuffins about 19 times since Saturday.)
iPhone week in review, Week Two. My sincerest apologies for the delay, Ambo. SERIOUSLY! (Thanks for caring. AOE.) Some of these are repeats, but I mean, whatever. Tired, you know? Still not sleeping. DEAR GOD MG JUST SLEEEEEEEEP! It hurts.
5 comments:
Oh my goodness, what a week! The things we take for granted sometimes, huh?
All of that really sucks but is oh so entertaining so thanks! Makes me realise complaining about slightly chilly Scottish weather is probably being a bit of a wuss.....
OMG I would be pissed! Did they figure out where the heck your $800 worth of gas went?! So annoying.
I would be super duper pissed. We had a much less severe episode of similar stupidity last year. Our sprinklers were not popping up out of the ground (one week after they were turned on and checked). So, I called the company. The guy came out..... examined the sprinklers and proclaimed, "This is STRANGE. Usually, if there is a leak in the buried hoses, there will be a HUGE wet spot in the grass. That's how I know where to dig!" So, he used up the hour he was paid for in advance (by digging holes in my grass randomly looking for leaks), plus another thirty minutes (at $30 per 15 minutes), THEN WENT OVER to the green box in the ground and checked the valve system. This "system" has a valve that turns 45 degrees when the sprinklers come on to let the water flow to the sprinkler heads. Yeah, it wasn't turning. WTF? Why wasn't that checked within 20 minutes of arrival? I mean, 90 minutes later? Really? It's not like that problem was a new one. I would have checked it myself if I had known how those things work! Stupid. Then, when I called to complain about the extra cost that ensued, the company told me to shove it. Awesomeness.
I love all of your pics! Glad you're home!
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