It was a hectic moment in our lives, as is usually the case when we have visitors. We love having visitors, but I'm sure anybody with younger children will agree it throws your schedule/routine off a bit. Well, this time we were not quite with it, as J was not only turning 50 (maybe it's the beginning of "old" age throwing us off, ha ha:)...but, we just weren't thinking clearly, or paying close enough attention to the SLAP US IN THE FACE SIGNS which we were truly gifted! Anyway, without further adieu:
It was not just another Thursday night...it was the night preceding my wonderful husband's 50th birthday celebration. The only difference between this Thursday and any other Thursday in our lives was, not only were J's two sisters to arrive later that evening, but J was to LEAVE for work...just for one night, THAT night, he had to go in third shift to assist with some installations or something. The beauty of it is, he got Thursday and Friday both off, but of course the poor chap was exhausted...and unfortunately so was I...afterall, I'm the very spiritual one who's always on the lookout for Divine Signs and messages; right?!!
Well, that night, before J left and before his sis's arrived, I heard the washing machine panel light up and make its sound: "ding ding ding DING!!" as if I had turned it on and it was ready to be programmed for a load. I ran in there, and not only was nobody in there, but the washer door was open, as I usually leave it open if I've done a load recently, to air it out. Impossible! This had NEVER happened before, and has never happened since...except, one hour later...door open, it happened again: "ding ding ding DING!!" Once again, door wide open, nobody even in there (and you cannot start the washer or program it with the door open! Kind of a safety feature for a front loader:O) At that point, I literally looked at J and said: "gosh, it feels like some sort of Divine Message!"
Fast forward to Friday...J goes into work for third shift...J's sis's arrive....J comes home and gets maybe two hours sleep before we start giving his sis's the whirlwind tour of our beautiful neck of the woods; which of course when you visit Hilton Head, you cannot NOT go to the beach....which they did...which leads to wet bathing suits and towels. When we arrived home that evening, I instructed EVERYBODY to please leave all suits and towels on the laundry room floor so I could wash them. Which I did. We had a great day, but J and I were exhausted come the end of the day.
Fast forward to Saturday....next on the agenda, Savannah...but first, one of the persons realized he/she failed to give me a wet beach towel, and asked if I could please wash it. Having been caught up on all the laundry, and not really wanting to wash one lonely towel, I sent the girls upstairs to scrouge around for anything that could be washed with it...which they did. But, we were also leaving for Savannah for the day....me, trying to be all organzied, decided to program the washer to go off eight hours later...and when I opened the tray to put the laundry soap in, I noticed a teeny bit of standing water in it....and made the grave error of pointing this out to my EXTREMELY sleep-deprived husband, who happens to be a manufacturing engineer. Before we could leave for Savannah, he had to check it out, make sure there was nothing blocked in the washing machine...there wasn't!...this involved opening a panel in the bottom of the washing machine...and involved putting the panel door back on...which he did...
Fast Forward 8.5 hours later....we arrive after our day in Savannah...I'm still in the Sienna, gathering stuff...J got the house open, everybody inside, then he opens the garage door, and what do I see...water, lots and lots of water everywhere...I walk in the house, what do I see? J and my sis's in law with towels, and water, lots and lots of water, all over our beautiful new wood flooring in the family room, which J worked VERY hard on for over a month! We spent HOURS cleaning up and ruined the motor on our old wet vac, and bought a new wet vac, then I ran to the southside of Savannah, which is a hike, to rent an industrial strength fan....and then, John tested the washer...except when he tested it, he forgot to connect the hose back to the wall!!! and we had lots of water on the floor, again:/ sigh...:/
oh, btw, the reason for the first flood, the panel needed to be tightened, just one more notch...and something even told J to check that, but we were rushing to get out the door...something even told J to shut down operations for the timer I had set on the washer...oh well:/
Ahhhhh, the signs, we ignored the DA% signs, wouldn't you say?
DO NOT ignore the signs; EVER!
The end. (I hope!)
