Thanks Buy Owner!

We spent the weekend up in Wisconsin with the Coles, celebrating five birthdays and Christmas. It was so less chaotic than one would imagine, and fun too.  The big kids are now old enough to play on their own and solve the occasional squabble, and the little kids are good with stealing toys and crawling all over each other.

(Jack, this is totally not the way to keep friends.)

We opened lots of great presents,

and consumed shameful amounts of Italian food, followed by shameful amounts of ice cream (which Cindy and I, aka the dieting duo, ran out for in single-digit temperatures in pajamas and parkas and very non-matching shoes just before closing time, driving a car with windows frozen shut, ordering what my neck of the woods calls a Choco-Cherry-Luuuuuv Blizzard.  Apparently Wisconsin isn't quite up to speed on that catchy name, as the teenager on the loudspeaker had me repeat it three times (in my best Barry White, naturally) then finally asking if I was interested in a Chocolate Cherry Blizzard.  I live ten miles from where the Jackson Five grew up.  Our DQ apparently makes ice cream with a bit more soul.)

 

I am still holding out for a decent Weight Loss Wednesday, however, as we made up for those 189,000 calories by spending the entire rest of the weekend chasing Jack up flights of stairs,

and away from continually pounding on a television larger than his bedroom, and closet.

We returned home on Sunday night to a chilly house.  The heat was running, but it was not keeping up.  By 6am the next morning it was son-of-a-bitching cold and I called the emergency number to the company that we just bought the furnace from.  In the two hours it took them to return my call, I layered the children's clothing as well as my own, turned on every light in the house for an asinine attempt at lightbulb heat (you've heard of it, right?) and whipped up a hot breakfast. 

The service man said that he would be out at some point.

At some point left my shivering self feeling sad and hopeless and...shivering.  As the morning marched on I repeatedly cursed this house that we are still living in despite all of our talks and plans and hopes and dreams of getting the hell OUT, and then I made coffee and danced and jumped and ran around like a damn nut with the kids to stay warm.  What else could I do?  Despite the fact that the furnace was running for two minutes and then kicking off for one minute, around the clock (hello?) the house was not heating.  And we could not leave.  Finally I got the kids down for their afternoon naps and decided that if the furnace guy did not arrive in the next hour I would bake something to create some oven heat.  If you can imagine, the lightbulb heat just wasn't cutting it. 

As the kids slept in thermal sleeping bags and seventeen layers of clothing, hats and mittens I sat at the computer, frustrated as a freezing house-hating homeowner can be, tired of non-working furnaces and aging roof shingles and basement seepage that can just kiss my ass already, and I crunched numbers on three hundred Excel spreadsheets to figure out which minute in time would be the earliest possible to get this damn house on the market and out of our hair.  I hate you, oh non-working new furnace, you bastard. 

I called Kevin at work with my newly crunched numbers and just let my feelings flow from my blue lips.  I wanted out.  Even if out meant an apartment and a space for all our crap at the local storage facility - hell, even those storage lockers are heated. OUT!

He calmly replied to my lunatic rant, with possibly thirteen co-workers gathered around his desk, that we should discuss this later tonight.

Later tonight?  Later tonight you will be thawing my frozen body like the damn Thanksgiving turkey.  Just say we can move, no matter what it takes, and I will cover myself over with another fleece blanket as I dial the realtor.

And then the furnace man arrived.

I kissed him hugged him with all my might threw cash at him as he entered led him to the basement.  He pulled the filter out and gave me a look just as dirty as the 16x21x1 piece of cardboard I was staring at.  I felt like a ten year old whose mother just learned she hadn't done her math homework all quarter.  The heat started running hotter than it had all day, and as we stood there for those two treacherous minutes waiting to see if it would shut off again, he explained that when you don't change your furnace filter in seven months, the furnace cannot get air and eventually starts to overheat.  In our case, every two minutes.  Then it has to shut down to cool off. 

I did my best to lay the blame on Kevin since he was not home play stupid, and thanked him for informing me that you should change that thing every month.  Because maintenance?  Who knew?

Within an hour we were back up at a fair seventy degrees, and were back to money-saving really-probably-shouldn't-move-to-an-apartment-or-storage-locker mode.

Possibly, the question is less where we should buy a new house, and more if we should buy a new house.

Comments

[jenabeeb]

Funny, Funny! The whole furnace story. Apparently it's different than your old one?

But the funniest line from this...that Indiana Dairy Queen makes ice cream with more soul. HilARious!

Good luck on WLW tomorrow, after our DELICIOUS Texaas Corral burgers today. I am hooked!

[Cindy]

Cute cute pictures. If I could only get blogger to upload mine we would be in good shape!
Thanks for such a great weekend!!
Let's do it again sometime!!!

Glad to hear you have heat in your house again!!!

[Amy W]

Audrey does the same to our tv that looks much like yours.

Glad your heat started working again!! I LOATHE being cold. Really I do.

[SJ]

Thank you so much for reminding me to check on our furnace filter....it's probably due for a change! Sorry you had to go through all that though.

My 15 month old bangs on our TV just like that - and he rolls over his brother all the time. It's quite funny.

This post cracked me up! Sounds like you had fun visiting your friends. Stay warm!

[Frema]

Oh, how funny. Part of the reason I'm not sad about being in an apartment is that I'd so intimidated by all the house-owning things I'll be expected to do. Because it will be my house.

Also, the kids are adorable! And KJ seems to be managing splendidly with the patch.

[Stacey]

Funny, funny! Your blogs always make me smile!