Kathryn Downing

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Adventures in Home Owning: Part 2

About a month ago, we decided it was time for our 10-year-old to start having more responsibilities around the house. Doing the dishes seemed like a good place to start. The first few days, I stood over his shoulder and nitpicked at him how to load the dishwasher, clean the sink, wipe the counters, etc. Then I figured he could handle it on his own. If he needed help, he’d ask me, right?

Last night, I walk into the kitchen to wash my hands and see ants crawling around on the sink. Growing up, we had ants around the dog food, but I don’t remember them crawling around on the kitchen counter. Of course, I look around and see why. Dirty dishes in the sink and on the counter. The stove top hasn’t been cleaned in a few weeks. There are empty pizza boxes on the counter. I don’t remember the last time the floor was scrubbed (I’m guessing at least a month since I’m the only one that does it). Tobias goes to bed. Troy takes the pizza boxes out to the trash and I spend the next 3-4 hours cleaning the kitchen alone while he plays Grand Theft Auto. In the immortal words of Charlie Brown… “Arrrgghhhh!”

I got some Terro over my lunch break and put it out, but I didn’t see any ants crawling around. Hopefully there isn’t a huge colony in the house. I’m praying they’re only there because the ground outside is too wet. Needless to say, we need to keep the house cleaner.

Adventures in Home Owning: Part 1

We’ve been getting a lot of rain around here and our basement started leaking sometime on Thursday. It started with damp carpet and water seeping through small cracks in the laundry room floor. We thought the water was coming mostly from one side of the house and was due to clogged gutters. Obviously, everyone in town was thinking the same thing because we called a few gutter cleaners and have yet to hear back from any of them.

So instead of relaxing on Saturday, I get up and go to Tae Kwon Do at 8:30. After a stop at Village Inn for breakfast with Tobias (Troy slept in), we came home while Troy took his crutches Home Depot to buy an extension for the hose. The gutters were too clogged for that to work, so I got out the ladder and spent the next few hours elbow deep in decomposing leaves getting sunburned while Troy watched and moved the hose around for me. Then I got to shovel out the leaves, dirt and muck on and in the back stairs leading down to the basement and the drain. I tried to pretend that the huge worms were cool to Tobias, but I was kind of grossed out. Even though I was wearing nitrile gloves, it felt like I was touching them with my bare hands. After that lovely bit of fun, we spent the rest of the day with the wet vac trying to keep the carpet as dry as we could.

There were more thunderstorms Saturday night and I got woken up on Sunday to find even more water in the basment. The drain by the back basement door was backed up and water was flowing under the door. The carpet was completely soaked. After cutting off his cast with my kitchen shears (grumble), he left on a day-long journey to try to find a store with a sump pump, buying a second shop vac instead, taking another trip to find an attachment for it, going back to the store to get the cap he left, then finally driving to his parents’ house to borrow a pump from their pond. I spent the day moving everything out of the basement except for the pool table and the huge block of wood we call an entertainment center. I think I got the short end of the stick. Troy redeemed himself by helping cut and carry out all the carpet and padding.

We’re still waiting for the floor to dry out. Rain is forcasted every day this week. Still, I think we’re lucky.