Water, water everywhere

Happy Columbus Day, Internet! Hey, Internet! I'm talking to you.

I know, but I've been too busy to post. For real. I'm not exaggerating. This is the first time I've been near a computer in a couple of days.

This is how bad it's been: for the first Friday in over a year, I didn't manage to come up with something for Mamarazzi. Susie Sunshine, Sarah O, and Kristin from Eva Las Vegas have put out a contract on me.

They've arranged to have me kidnapped and cooped up with incredibly grumpy people in less than pristine surroundings. With no running water. Or toilets.

Well, too bad, my would-be-punitive fellow Mamarazzi, because BEEN THERE/DONE THAT. And I escaped.

In other words, in addition to the usual thrills of my existence (driving, tile-picking-out, music lessons, rehearsals, laundry, teacher telephone calls, school paperwork, homework assistance, and cleaning) yesterday I also managed to fly with my family to New Hampshire. Where we arrived at our house at 1:00 in the morning. Only to discover that my brother-in-law had ripped out the downstairs bathroom. And that the water was turned off.

AND THE TOILETS WOULDN'T FLUSH.

And as if that weren't enough, I had been so smart. And listen to me, internet: you never want to be smart the way your Poppy can be smart. It doesn't pay.

See, what with the tile-picking-out and such, the laundry had started to pile up, and I had a genius idea. Genius! I decided I would pack all dirty clothes and launder them when I arrived.

So there we were, in the middle of the night, with a suitcase full of dirty clothes, in a house with no running water.

I did what any sensible woman would do. I brushed my teeth using a bottle of grape Dasani water from the refrigerator and went to bed. (Just so you know, Grape Dasani + Colgate = cough syrup, but not in an interesting getting-high way.) This morning I changed our airplane reservations. And this afternoon we flew back to Chicago. Where there are toilets and faucets and an ice maker and a whole laundry room simply brimming with washing machines and dryers.