It is just quite unbelievable the mishaps that have plagued my life since last Thursday! However, in spite of the onslaught I am attempting to maintain a cherry outlook and keep moving forward. Allow me to explain…Thursday, I went over to the cottage to make beds for expected guests arriving on Friday and found the furnace fan running continuously and even though the heat was on, and the temperature was set at a comfy 73, the room temperature was a very chilly 44 degrees. A new thermostat had been installed on 12/8 and when I contacted the repairman, (whom I’ve been using now for 6 years at our home and my hubby’s oral surgery practice) he assured me that it must have been caused by a power surge or glitch and if I reset the thermostat all would be well. Which I did and when I left about two hours later all seemed well.
Friday mid-day my guests arrive and as we are going through the cottage it was discovered that there was no water!? I was sure I had paid the bill so a cut-off was out of the question, (although I did drive out to verify that the meter was indeed OK). But, upon further inspection I discovered there is about a 12 inch piece of pipe behind the cottage that USED to be enclosed in the underpinning and apparently when the new underpinning was installed back in February of ‘09 the gentleman who provided that work for me apparently did not see the need to enclose the pipe, therefore allowing it to FREEZE during the 13 degree temperatures we had Thursday night. A quick call to my trusty plumber and five minutes after his arrival he had it cleared and the water began flowing nicely. He secured the exposed pipe for me with that wonderful gray Styrofoam Pipe Insulation and all was well. Even so, he advised to allow a stream to flow inside the cottage during this current extreme cold spell. (So much for GLOBAL WARMING eh?!)
Oh yeah, did I mention the flat tire I had on my vehicle in between? Yeah! truly a BLACK FRIDAY if ever there was one, but it was not over….. Mercedes-Benz has this cute little ‘inflatable spare’ for some of their vehicles…mine, with it’s own SPECIAL lug nuts…! The repairman had never put a spare on a Mercedes before, and could barely figure out how to get the thing out of the trunk of the car. (Is this really happening to me?!) I nearly froze while reading him the directions on how to change and inflate the spare. What a three-ring circus! He had to take my tire to the dealer for repair and I could have it switched out the next morning. What a privilege!
Saturday mid-day I’m at the dealer waiting for my tire make-over and my cell phone message alert beeps in about half a dozen messages….from Friday evening. You see, the stone on the exterior of our home being anywhere from 6-8 inches thick over the 6″ studs sometimes prevents cell phone reception indoors, and when you go outside, whenever that is, your phone gets ‘caught up’. Mine did, finally, and amidst the messages was one from the cottage guests…apparently upon returning from Friday evening Dinner-out-on-the-town they entered the Cottage to a blazing 86 degrees! Thankfully through their resourcefulness (aren’t all scrappers resourceful?!) they Googled the thermostat over the internet and found the owners manual and re-set the thermostat AGAIN.
Ahhhh, but that was not the end of it …..wait till you hear about Saturday night!
The weekend was not a TOTAL LOSS though, BAYLOR Men’s Basketball tromped Oklahoma!! Woo Hoo!, GO BEARS!! Men’s Basketball is going to be GREAT this year!
I’ll let you know about the rest of the weekend next time, till then, SMILE!
Blessings to you!
Katherine
