12.29.2016

(Almost) Real Time



On the fifth day of Christmas my true love gave to me an uncomfortable lesson in humility. (Sing it with me now!)

This early bird drinks tea while I swig coffee.  It's shaping up to be one of those days.  Yesterday, the children and I decluttered and ordered most of the upstairs and downstairs, as much as one can order them in a household of ten that-- especially in this Christmas season-- owns too much stuff, and today I planned to spend a ten-hour day tackling the basement.  It's been the dumping ground for several weeks, and I never even finished the "put all the summer clothes into appropriate bins" task, so there are piles of clothes all over, too.  Plus, a month ago, our compression tank sprang a leak, and before we had it replaced, I had to empty a couple of shelves of canned goods that were flooded, so there are canning jars all over the floor, mixed with all manner of detritus from weeks of neglect.

Well, ten minutes ago, one of the nicest men in the world dropped in to check our boiler's nozzle size so he and a friend of ours can replace it tomorrow.  I don't even want to go down to the basement to see how much shin-deep laundry-on-the-floor he had to trudge through to get to the boiler, but I must.

I'll bolster my spirits with a second cup of coffee first.

6 comments :

Abigail said...

Seriously.
So bad you cannot even imagine it, thank goodness, unless you are a hoarder. This is like my dad's basement all over again...

Chieftain of Seir said...

Let the record show that the only thing he was scandalizes by was the fact that you paid a fortune to have that pressure tank installed when he would have done it for the cost of parts.

Farmgirl said...

I'm amused, because I was writing my own version of a messed-up carol just about the same moment you were. Must be one of those weeks. :)

sarah said...

This is my constant trial!

Abigail said...

Oh, Teman.
You are too gracious! But, then, you only saw the basement the following morning after the frenzied clean-up. ;) Also, I was so stinking annoyed when you and Keith fouled my plans! What did you do, rip the cards open two steps from the house?! You didn't even give me a shred of hope for the future...not that I can' try again.

Michelle,
Oh, yeah. I'm with you (minus the vomit). What a week! Hope you're all feeling rested and refreshed now that weeks have passed, and glad you've learned to see the humor in what could be a rotten event. :)

SarahCPTate,
I'm with you, sister, and then some. We're all too rich, that's all. The constant weeding out of wealth is the smallest of burdens, though, and one I remind myself I'm blessed to have.

Abigail said...

p.s. but I still would have been horrified to have even my MOTHER see our basement, let alone this nice man!!!