Well, today I got an illustration of just how well-oiled my “lifeline network” really is. I text my Mom this morning, mostly in a “Ha, just my luck!” kind of way–no emergency (yet):
ME: “So, I blew my nose, and I went to wash my hands. ‘How odd, the cold water tap is stuck. No, it’s turning just fine.’ Turned the left tap….no water. Turned BOTH taps to max., at which point my brain finally registers–we have NO WATER! Our bill is current and there were no notices of maintenance. No flood or whatnot anywhere to indicate a burst pipe or main, either.
SPOKE TOO SOON on the last part…all I’d done was peer out windows around the house quickly looking for bubbling up water in the yard or street.
I had some more trashbags to put at the curb for garbage collection today, and I opened our front door and was greeted to a flowing stream of water gushing by our front porch. I turned to my right and immediately thought, “Ohhh, no, that can’t be good.” Water was flowing in rapid fashion out from under the entire length of our closed garage door.
Holy.crap!
Meanwhile, Sara, beloved girl, has been sitting in her Pack & Play upstairs and is getting progressively more ticked off that Momma has gone missing and she’s due a bottle. I’d already called Justin to let him know we had no water, and I’d already texted Mom the laissez faire “Huh, we have no water.” Suddenly, I was calling Justin again with a wailing Sara in the background to tell him, “Houston, we have a problem–we have a leak and it’s inside the garage, and it’s bad! But I haven’t gotten into the garage far enough to see WHAT is flooding the garage.”
Anyway, in rapid fashion I had grandma en route to entertain Sara and give her the overdue bottle; Dad on the line to help walk me through either turning off the house water main (a PITA without the right wrench and elbow grease, especially since I was staring at the City Water shut-off and not the consumer-accessible one) and help me discover the water softener’s emergency shut-off value since it was the water softener that was overflowing in rapid fashion; and Justin and Joel (Daddy to rock star Nathan, who will be coming home VERY SOON NOW!!!!) pulling up in the driveway during their abbreviated lunch break to help further. I had a veritable posse of family and friends en route and could finally catch my breath.
So… Mom, Dad, Justin and Joel — THANK YOU SO MUCH. You all rock. Totally! Thank you for the assistance, guidance, words of wisdom and general moral support. I’m lost when it comes to most home appliance maintenance, sad-to-say.
The good news is we have water service inside the house again. The bad news is our water softener is either dead or ailing, and our garage is a bit of disaster (but we need to clean it anyway to make room for the fourth bicycle that’s coming into the family soon.) Could be lots worse… no drywall damage, no house damage (the garage slope out to the yard and away from our porch or foundation is perfect and kept the raging waters well away from everything…except maybe our side yard.
So, there’s my drama for the day… and a blog entry, so hey, not too shabby. Hehehe
