Isn't it amazing how a different perspective can sometimes rescue a day?
 
Yesterday began with Ruffle having 5 hours of cage banging, no-I-won't-eat,
no-I won't drink, I will spill everything possible and give you 3 loads of
wash needing hot water tantrums.  It finally got so bad dealing with her
that I just sat down and hugged her while I sobbed and sobbed.  At that
point I just plain needed a mom or a wife (Hubbies are wonderful but our
chore divisions mean that he's less familiar with certain stresses.) but I
have neither; that's just life.
 
Anyway that shocked her so much (since I am a middle-aged fart who has often
had no choice but to carry the load so I don't cry much; I just do what
needs doing) that she ate and drank, and became quiet enough for me to do
another caulking job.
 
Then Alyse who had borrowed a cage returned it (with flowers!!!) so I headed
down to the basement to put it away and was greeted by water seeping from
under the door.  By that point Steve was home from extra work so he shut off
the hot water heater (which we were going to replace in 10 days) and we
manned the brooms.  Face it, when you watch expenses partly by living in a
small condo the basements are not large so 40 gallons gets quite deep.  To
top it off I had been sorting a bunch of stuff and while we have plastic
bins some things were outside them (such as a very comprehensive 1960s
collection of MADs in fair to excellent condition -- which became boiled
pulp beyond even freeze drying) for sorting, and two of the bins had cracks.
(Mea culpa; I should have arranged for an earlier replacement and taken into
account that sick ferrets require a LOT of hot wash which can strain a water
heater.)
 
Since it was so hot and soggy mold started growing almost right away.  (This
was a catastrophic give-out so even though it was 68' outside, the basement
was still over 100' when found; thank goodness no one was standing there
when it gave!) I have steroids for asthma, but Steve so rarely has an attack
that he has no meds, and he is as stubborn as I am and did not want me to
strain myself since I just got over a bug and I have permanent upper body
neurological damage.  Finally, I had to tell him that I would force him to
ride in an ambulance if he didn't stay outside the basement, so he got to
carry loads to the dumpster while I worked inside the basement for four or
five hours.  Boy, are we glad that we didn't lose any family keepsakes, and
that we caught the two soaked tax record files in time to save the
documentation.  Whew!
 
Once we got that settled I put our clothing through several cold washes, and
guess what?  A clip which secures the bin gave out (should not have; I had
them replaced last year) and we wound up with some of the laundry sporting
holes and tears from it catching on the garments.  Sigh.
 
That was when Steve put it all into perspective.  He said, "Well, I guess
we're lucky.  Given their problems we could have had Meltdown, or Ruffle, or
both die today, so I guess this isn't all that bad." Sometimes finding a
different slant makes all the difference, doesn't it?
 
The Dripping, Mildewing Crandalls
[Posted in FML issue 1561]