Tweet This Post

Tweet This Post

October 7, 2006
Rolling

She officially rolled over last night. She has been close for so long now and finally, last night as she lay between The Boy and me she managed to roll over.
I am hearing foreboding music as she creeps ever closer to mobility.

Tweet This Post

October 3, 2006
Putting the fun in fungus

We have had a soggy little drama play out over the last few days. Sunday night as I went  in to the bathroom to brush my teeth for bed I found water dripping from the ceiling. I quickly ran upstairs and knocked on the door of the apartment above mine. No answer. The man who lives there only stays there half the week. He spends the rest of the week in New Jersey with his family.
I asked Huns what they did the last time the apartment flooded. (Said flood was the reason my apartment was available for me in the first place – the girl that lived here before me was pissed when her entire wardrobe was ruined due to the flood in her closet.) She said they had to call the fire department to break the door down and shut off the water.
I called the fire department and they arrived almost immediately, sirens blaring, lights flashing. It was all very melodramatic.
The firemen trooped up the four narrow flights to my apartment and started filing in. There must have been ten of them. Ten fully dressed fire fighters wielding shiny brass axes. I wondered how many could actually fit into my little studio. It brought to mind telephone booth packing from the sixties.
After staring at the water gently flowing from my ceiling they made their way upstairs to pound fruitlessly on the door to 5F. Radios squawked. Fire boots shuffled. It was finally decided to raise the ladder up to the window to avoid breaking down the door.
I have three giant floor to ceiling windows facing the front of the building and had front row seats to all the excitement unfolding outside. First the ladder was clanked around ninety degrees to the truck. Slowly it began to smoothly stretch towards the windows upstairs. Next came a brave fireman, ascending with loud thumps to each step.
More radios squawked. More fire boots shuffled. I could hear the stairs creaking in protest as the rest of the firemen descended and left the building.
Confused, I went out to the hall to hear the verdict. Outside the door to 5F I found The Boy standing awkwardly with Marco. Marco is our obnoxious neighbor. He considers himself to be the building super. As the acting super he takes it upon himself to shovel snow from the building stoop and butt his nose in to everybody’s business, but stops short of ever fixing anything or scheduling any repairs.
“Where did the firemen go? What’s the verdict?” I asked.
Marco smiled sheepishly and shrugged his shoulders. “Uh. They left.”
“What?!”
“Yeah. They said they looked through the window and only saw a puddle, so it’s not an emergency.”
“Well, it stands to reason that the puddle is coming from SOMEWHERE!” I stammered.
Marco answered with another helpful shrug so artfully executed it managed to convey a very succinct “Bummer, dude.”

*    *    *    *    *

The next morning after emptying the many pots and pans I had set about the bathroom before going to bed exasperated, I called the fire department again.
This time I was informed that due to the slowness of the leak and the fact that no water was coming from any electrical fixtures, it was not an emergency.
I begged to differ.
I was then told the only thing they could do was turn off the water to the whole building until the man in 5F came home and fixed the leak – whenever that may be.
“So if he has gone to Europe for a month our building is supposed to go without water indefinitely?” I asked.
“Ma’am, I’m simply telling you what we can do. We can only remove the cause of the emergency by shutting off the water. We can’t fix the plumbing.”
I pondered this frustrating reality and ultimately opted not to have all our water turned off. The optimist in me was certain that 5F would return any minute and relieve me of this watery burden. The pessimist in me likes to point out that the optimist in me is often times wrong. This was one of those times.
It continued to rain in my bathroom. The Boy was quite put off by this and could not believe I was not calling someone about the problem. The Boy is quite good at that; Demanding something be done, but offering no suggestions as to what that something should be.
The drama finally came to a head early the next morning. The water works in the bathroom escalated from steady drizzle to violent downpour. Water was coming out of the bathroom light fixture, qualifying  this as an official emergency! Yay!
I called the fire department again. Once more the truck came, sirens blaring, lights flashing. Once more firemen trooped up the four narrow flights to my little studio and filed in. Once more they watch the water pouring from my bathroom ceiling. This time they had no qualms about breaking down the door to 5F.
The flood had been the result of an incorrectly installed new water heater. The genius in 5F put it in just before leaving for the week. Said genius had the nerve to be outraged at having his door broken down. I had the nerve to be outraged right back, asking him how he would have handled the situation.
Now here I sit. My bathroom is no longer impersonating the South American rain forest. My walls are slowing drying inside. 5F has a solid new door. And as I was brushing my teeth this morning what did I notice stretching up from the corner of the bathroom where the vanity meets the wall? A little white capped mushroom growing in the stillness.

Tweet This Post

Tweet This Post