Thump

I started out this week with a near concussion, highlighted it by nearly getting flooded out of our crazy a$$ ghetto fabulous apartment, and now I'm ending it feeling queasy after eating some suspect shrimp.  It's never a dull moment around here.

I don’t remember (perhaps due to my injury) what prompted me to go on a cleaning frenzy last week.  Normally, I use a lightweight, battery operated vacuum cleaner. However, the battery is in constant need of recharging and while it sounds raring to go, after about twelve seconds, I’m usually found swearing and picking up lint, cookie crumbs and bits of dried up clay with my bare hands.

Sick of fighting with the machine, I braved our storeroom to extract our big vacuum cleaner, also known as my nemesis or the vortex of evil.  Built like an armored van, and probably weighing about the same, this miserable contraption only works with an extension arm because the little sucking wheels things are faulty.

With every tug, pull, and turn, the chord got entangled on our many sofas (thanks to my couch collecting spouse, P), chairs, and sometimes even on imaginary objects.  After a labored run around our apartment, I took another fifteen minutes to run around detangling the long electrical wire from around our apartment.

I was nursing a nearly dislocated shoulder after lugging that blasted appliance, twisting it in between furniture, and picking it up the numerous times it crashed on the floor.  I was plotting to go online and put in a review for it--"sucks, but not in a good way".

I knelt down on the ground to pack away the attachments and then boom, the handle of the vacuum slams down with a thud. Luckily for the cleaner, my forehead broke its fall. Unluckily for me, I literally saw stars and tears started pouring from my eyes.

I really thought I was about to pass out.  My poor little five year old, Lanes, was given instructions to tell her father upon his return from work about my misadventure with cleaning tools. You know, just in case he walked in and found me sprawled across the floor or claiming to not remember who he was.

Lanes dutifully ran up to him with a rundown of events, and as usual, P listening but not hearing, assumed his offspring was exaggerating.  I was swearing that I didn’t bruise easily, because P was flicking his wrist and suggesting that Lanes and I go to acting school as we would have a lucrative career on some day time soap. 

I was not amused. Now that I am indeed looking for a job, well in theory at least, maybe I should take up P's sarcastic advice. When I have a dashing costar named Allejandro, he might not be quite so smug. Then again, at the rate I'm going I might be hired to play Allejandro's mother, but still.

Any old how, my bruised ego and forehead figured that at least we were getting a three day weekend.  On Friday night, I was enjoying channel surfing in solitude. Lanes was snoring and talking in her sleep and P was tucked up in bed fighting online with frequent flyer miles—a typical evening for us.

As I was about to turn in, I noticed a huge puddle on our bathroom floor.  I henpecked P a little, heckling that he had left the shower curtain open while showering and I begrudgingly cleaned up the mess because he was out for the count.

Ten minutes later, I left my 'CSI:Miami' and walked by the bathroom, to find an even bigger puddle. Has anyone else noticed that bad things happen only when I’m watching that show? The third time this happened (I’m swift that way), I realized that we had a leak. On a Friday night before a three day weekend. No one was there to help us.

I panicked and called out to P, but as always, when crap goes down in our ghetto fab, he is always doing one of three things: sleeping, firing off résumés, or shopping.  I’m left to nurse the problem alone.

I kept a solitary tattered towel as a buffer and spent a restless night cuddled up with Lanes because her room is right in front of the toilet. On Saturday, P blamed the issue on condensation, but I was determined to get a plumber over. 

P was ferociously cleaning up the water, only to find himself mopping up some more. Luckily, for once, the apartment manager returned a call, and by afternoon we got some help.  The good news was that the leak had stopped for the moment. The bad news is, the plumber had no idea where it was emanating from.

I think ignorance is bliss and I thought I’d leave it there then. Since our apartment building seems to behave like it is constantly auditioning for a role in ‘Water World’ I got the plumber’s cell phone down for good measure.  Besides the fire department, the cops, and pizza delivery, this is the next best thing to have on your fridge door in this joint.

Other than that, the weekend was pleasant. On Saturday, Lanes had a birthday party.  P left the bossy lady (GPS) behind and we got gloriously lost as usual. The next day, my fabulous friend, Jas, babysat Lanes for hours while P and I watched a movie--in an actual theater. We were so used to never doing anything alone that for awhile I think we felt lost without Lanes. It felt like leaving home without your wallet.

Speaking of which, always eager to attend any kind of event, Lanes was delighted about a book fair in school. I thought I’d break into her piggy bank and give her money for her to buy things for herself. I had some far fetched idea that it would be exciting for her and teach her responsibility or something of that nature.

When she realized where the money was coming from, she very politely and calmly explained to me that it was not very nice of me to take her money out of her bank without her permission. She chastised me in such a matter of fact way that I felt really bad about it.

Why do I feel like I’ll be having that same conversation with her thirty, ok forty years from now when I’m living with her and sneak into her purse to buy some chocolate? Since the writing and job hunting thing are not going so well for me, I'm assuming this is the sad fate that is in store for me. With that I must sign off! More musings from BC next week...