The Year of the Appliances

I forget if this is The Year of the Dog, the Rat or the Horse but for me it’s turning into The Year of the Appliances.   My February post, “Goodbye, Old Friend” described the sad demise of my old, workhorse freezer, although that wasn’t a surprise.  We were surprised, however, when Paul’s little refrigerator for chilling his home brew unexpectedly froze up a month ago leaving us with a giant, pale ale popsicle.  An ugly sink/garbage disposal problem led me to spend a recent Saturday evening with the Roto-Rooter man; and, while everything seems to be okay now, I’m terrified of putting anything more substantial than tomato soup down my disposal.  A routine, annual check-up for our air conditioner found a coolant leak and two options – wait and see if it gets worse or get a new air conditioner.  In the hot weather we’re having, I can’t tell what is getting worse – the air conditioner or my hot flashes.

After everything else, on a recent night, we heard scrabbling in the bedroom wall which spells CRITTERS.  I know this isn't really an appliance issue but it falls under the heading of Household Hassles and adds to the general angst.  Anyway, when I called Critter Control,  they offered to diagnose the problem for $180 - WRONG-O.  Instead,  Paul set Have-A-Heart traps in the attic, baited with peanut butter- the non-organic, fat and sugar laced brand - so now all we have to do is wait for whatever it is to die of bad cholesterol.

My slightly out of warranty washer staged the latest appliance revolt. I had a bad feeling a few weeks ago when I started the washer before running errands and returned two hours later to find it still looping through Rinse and Spin.  This machine has an electronic touch-pad  instead of the old dial-a-cycle set-up – just the kind of jazzy feature that causes heartache for people over 40.  Dru, the repairman, was very sympathetic; but he said he had never seen this specific problem with this brand of washer which wasn’t any consolation. I told him to order whatever parts we needed and did eventually convince the manufacturer to pay for the parts after six  long phone calls to Australia. If you're ever in a similar situation, here are some useful phrases: "I never would have expected this from a high-end appliance," "This is the first appliance I've bought from your company and it will also be the last," "I think Consumer Reports would be interested in this situation," and, finally, an all-purpose phrase  I learned from our attorney friend, Rick, in Chicago, "That is unacceptable"

The new parts were scheduled to go in on a Thursday so, rather than constantly babysitting the washer, I let the dirty laundry pile up for several days. During that time, in an unprecedented gesture, Paul added all of his golf socks, some of which haven’t seen the inside of a washer since the start of golf season.  Unfortunately, when Dru came to install the new control panel, he accidentally damaged another part leaving the washer totally out of commission until a replacement could be ordered.

Just like Sara Sylvia Cynthia Stout’s garbage,* our laundry pile continued to grow with towels and linens from weekend guests and sweaty biking and golf clothes.  At least the situation offered some recreational opportunities.  I’ve always been good at Garbage Blockhead, a variation on the kids’ game that involves stacking up yogurt containers, egg cartons, apple cores, cracker boxes, etc. instead of blocks - the blockhead is the person who adds the piece that brings the whole mess down. We got pretty far with Laundry Blockhead before everything fell out of the dirty clothes basket.  Finally I was forced to do a Tour de Laundry, farming out loads to two neighbors and Paul's mother so we would have clean clothes for our week in New York.

It’s a sad state of affairs when you’re joyful about doing wash, but that’s where I was this afternoon after Dru finally replaced the additional part and got the washer running again. I’m on my fourth load which consists of some uniquely stinky towels that have been festering in the basement for over 2 weeks.  In about an hour and a half, I expect to hit Laundry Nirvana, the point at which everything in the house is clean.  After that, I plan to give stern lectures to the dishwasher, the ice-maker, the food processor and my cute little droid of a vacuum cleaner in case they are planning to act up anytime soon. To quote the Three Stooges, “Enough is too much.”

*P.S. Wondering whether Sara Sylvia Cynthia Stout is a talk show host, a rock star or a new microbrew? Click the link below for a reading by the poet, Shel Silverstein who wrote great kids' poems, travel articles for Playboy and Johnny Cash's hit, "A Boy Named Sue."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvNhhEtUGJY
P.P.S. I have no photos of people doing laundry so these photos are of people having fun NOT doing laundry

Happy Birthday

Well, the Birthday Monster made his unwelcome annual appearance at my house two weeks ago. Paul is now in his favorite time of the year –the five weeks when he is living with an older woman.  Actually, I can’t complain too much, since this was a really special birthday - early morning and late afternoon naps with Willem snoozing on my chest and a cake with “Happy Birthday Nana” in lavender icing.  It doesn't get much better than that.  

This birthday brought back lots of memories of past birthdays and birthday parties.  I’ve come a long way from my

second birthday party which seems to have been a fancy dress event. I'm surprised I wasn't wearing white gloves and smoking a clothespin in honor of the occasion.   I don't have any photos or any memory of the rest of my  kid birthday parties except the last one.  For my eleventh birthday, my mom planned a grown-up affair modeled after her own bridge parties.   She set up  three tables of Crazy Bridge, cut sandwiches in the shapes of hearts, diamonds, clubs and spades and set out fancy bridge snacks.  The party ended, however, with a food fight. (I do remember who started it, but I’m not telling.)

As an adult, I prefer to keep a low profile where birthdays are concerned; and, for the record, a surprise birthday party is DEFINITELY not on my bucket list.   I did love the time David and John surprised me with a birthday breakfast in bed – home made brownies with a crunchy red glaze which is what happens if you make icing using granulated sugar rather than confectioners’ sugar.  It was a little funky but, hey, brownies are brownies, especially at 7 a.m. when you’re expecting Cheerios. 

I was always much more into celebrating other people’s birthdays, starting with David and John.  Their early

birthday parties were fun but a little wild – our party photos are blurry, crowded and chaotic.  There was an outer space party with a blue, rocket shaped cake, a pirate party with tons of balloons and a dinosaur party with a brontosaurus piñata and “Pin the Teeth on the Tyrannosaurus,” designed by John.  When the boys were older, the logistics of crowd control led us to move the birthday parties to a nearby bowling alley, which worked well except for the time when one of David’s guests, a known wing-nut, lofted his bowling ball into the air.  It landed three alleys over.

Paul and I survived all the Over-the-Hill birthday parties for our friends and family as they turned 40. Now, 40 seems more like halfway up the hill and the joke gifts like Ex-Lax, Advil and Depends aren’t necessarily a joke.  Paul’s 50th which he celebrated with our dinner club offered a surreal  moment.  It was July 3rd so, after dinner, we sat in lawn chairs outside for fireworks and sparklers arranged by the host couple’s teen-aged son.  We suddenly realized that, 30 years hence, it would be déjà vu with us sitting in rockers on the front porch of the old folks home while some nice young man set off fireworks for us, handed around and lit our sparklers and tried to keep us from falling asleep.

Two family birthdays stand out from the rest.  For my mom’s 65th , we all decided to surprise her at the beach.  This allowed my dad to keep a bunch of secrets from my mom – the best birthday present he ever had and it wasn't even his birthday.  He loved playing James Bond, keeping her in the dark while he rented a large beach house, arranged a birthday dinner and collected some basics with which to stock the house.  She, on the other hand, signed him up for a hearing test and an Alzheimer’s assessment because he kept buying paper towels, toilet tissue, soft drinks and lots of other stuff which she loudly and repeatedly told him they didn’t need.  When we made our unexpected appearance, Mom was both surprised and relieved.

My dad’s 70th birthday could have been titled “Kangaroo Court.”  We celebrated on Friday night in my brother’s beach condo with streamers, confetti, cake and ice cream.  By Saturday afternoon, everyone was looking for the remains of the 12 pints of Graeter’s ice cream I had brought to the party.  My brother denied all knowledge of the alleged pints and wound up on trial for ice cream theft, a capital offense in our family.  The evidence was circumstantial but compelling – he couldn’t produce the left-over pints and eyewitnesses had seen him and his family tanking into a breakfast of birthday cake and ice cream that morning.  The deck was stacked against Mark with a hard-nosed prosecutor (David), a sincere but green defense attorney (John), damning witnesses (his wife and daughters) and a

bloodthirsty jury (my parents and my sister.)   Clearly, he was headed for the gallows. A grave miscarriage of justice was averted by a last minute visit to the locus in quo, i.e. his condo, where the extra Graeter’s was found in a plastic bag at the back of the freezer.  Just another fun, family get-together!

I guess, in the end, birthdays aren’t so bad; and the birthday greetings from family and friends are very nice.  Of course, my brother always weighs in with some zinger of a card.  This year, he also left a voice message: “Happy Birthday . . . I guess now you’re going to have to change your blog to “Getting Further Away From Sixty.”

 Click the link below to hear "In Just No Time At All," my favorite song about getting older. It's part of a scene from the musical "Pippin." 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIfAGN6o3Jg&feature=PlayList&p=957223BC4D73B890&playnext_from=PL&playnext=1&index=40

That Was The Week That Was

Last week, I spent a magical three days with David, Megan and Willem, enjoying the time to hold him and to watch him yawn, smile, stretch, grimace and vibrate with the full-body hiccups.  Luckily, I didn't have to cut his nails (Megan uses a baby nail file from a cool little baby dopp kit.)  I did, however, serve as her accomplice in giving Willem his first sponge bath and I sure hope he doesn't hold it against me.

When I got home from my Nana adventures late Thursday night, I was faced with a to-do list the length of  "War and Peace."  I did make time to set up Skype so we can see and talk to Willem live through the computer.  The possibilities are endless and we expect to get his take on the situation in North Korea soon.  One of Paul's patients told me about a friend in Cincinnati who, like us, has a son, daughter-in-law and infant grandson in New York.  Recently, the son, a firefighter, was home alone with the baby.  He called up Grandma, said

he needed time for a shower and asked her to do some remote babysitting.  The baby, in his infant seat, was positioned  in front of the camera when Grandma asked what she should do if the baby needed immediate attention.   Dad replied, "Just yell - I'll hear you."  Couldn't be easier.

Our busy three-day weekend featured highs like a visit from John, bike rides and golf and lows like an unexpected guest appearance by Ron, the Roto-Rooter Man at our Saturday night cook-out.  (Ron chose the bratwurst over the metts and passed on the sauteed onions and peppers.)  Tuesday morning, after seeing John off for Nashville and firing a shot of ant-powder at the colony boiling up from below our front porch, I played office all day long.  As a substitute for Paul's Office Manager, I answered phones, scheduled appointments, filed charts, met and greeted patients, ordered office carpeting, reviewed a new credit card processing sytem and managed to sneak in a few games of Spider Solitaire.

The point of all this is to explain why I didn't have a regular Monday post this week.  Maybe I should have said the dog ate my post or at least chewed up my keyboard; but those who have read my March post, "Going to the Dogs," would never believe that.  I'm throwing in some of David and Megan's latest Willem photos as a peace offering and I plan to be back next Monday.