Open the curtains, forget what I said.
And what you wished for could come true.
You aren't surprised love, are you?"
-Guster
This time last year our furnace kind of broke. I called our service provider, they sent out a technician. He fixed it but said within a year the furnace should be replaced. It would cost about $5000.00.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever dude. Thanks for coming out and getting her running again.
Well. Here we are, a year later.
We have three zones in the house. Upstairs, downstairs, and woodstove/loft. The downstairs zone is not working. At all. Without heat right now are the kitchen/dining area, the brown room (which I lovingly refer to as "The Room of Requirement." Harry Potter fans can guess what is in that room) and the pink room where we play our playstation.
As far as my mind goes, as long as the bedrooms and upstairs bath have heat, that's great. We can sleep comfortably at night. Woodstove room is where we hang and watch TV and we have a cord of wood. That'll last for a couple of months (or 3 days at the rate we're burning. ha!) The loft is above the woodstove room, and consequentially the warmest room in the house. It is where am right now. Comfy, cozy and warm.
So the only problem areas are the kitchen, where we don't spend a lot of time outside of cooking. We eat in front of the TV so we won't freeze to death sitting at the dining table. The playstation hasn't been used in a couple of days because it is just prohibitively cold. I was in there the other day playing, wrapped in a fleece blanket and wearing a hat. I quit because my fingers were too cold. The downstairs bathroom is like using an outhouse in far northern Maine this time of year. Brrrr. So it is a quick in and out there, and only used when someone is in the upstairs bathroom hogging the joint up.
I can live without the zone working on the furnace. The bad news is, that probably means another zone will break and then we'll be screwed. Thing is, I don't have $5000 handy. I don't even think we can finance it.
We will have to get it fixed because the last thing I want is a pipe bursting in the kitchen or bathroom. So it is going to have to get fixed.
And I am kicking myself for not fighting for the furnace to be replaced by the previous owner. It should have been a show stopper for us. Replace the furnace or we don't buy the house. Thank you, have a nice day. But the dude wouldn't do it and we didn't want to lose the house... so we acquiesced. We gave in. And we decided we'd replace it... when it needed to be replaced.
So the long and the short of it is I have to have it done. That bums me out. Meh.
We had an incredibly busy weekend. The kind that makes me want to crawl back into bed and stay there for a full day. Friday night, I left work in Marblehead, drove the hour home to get Jess and her friend Lizzy, turned around and drove the hour back to Marblehead. Why? Well, a bunch of Jess' friends from Shakespeare were in the high school production of Cabaret. At least 10 kids were in the cast, and she wanted to see it.
I'm not a big musical theatre fan... but always support the kids in all they do. So Jess wanted to be there, and I took her. And... long and the short of it is that this was a tremendously well done production. I had forgotten so much about the play, I forgot that there is a lot of homosexuality, a lot of promiscuity, an abortion, alcoholism, and ... NAZIS! lots and lots of nazis! In fact, it was slightly unnerving at the end when a huge, giant red banner with a giant gianormous huge swastika gets lowered from the ceiling... and that's the end of the play. I could feel the audience hesitating to clap in the end. Jess said "oh! I want to clap but not for THAT THING!" It was sort of weird.
It was very nice to see her friends, and see that Lizzy totally LOVED the performance... so much so she wants to buy a DVD.
Several of the cast members were stellar vocalists, and aside from a few audio glitches, the entire production was great. Glad I went.
Saturday saw me running around doing stupid nothings. At about 4pm I took Geoff to a friend's birthday party. They had it at an indoor sports complex, so for about 30 minutes they got to play flag football. Most of the kids at the party were on Geoff's football team, so it was a blast to see them executing plays and ripping the flags off each other. They were hysterical, and it was very physical. We bailed from the party early because I had a date with Jess (again) to go up to Portsmouth NH to see Groovelily (aka "Amy Church") in their touring production of "Striking 12."
I mentioned that I'm not big into "musical theatre," but this isn't musical theatre. Sure, it's music, in a theatre, and a story is told... but it is different, better, wonderful. Amy turned me on to them a couple of years back, and they're just great.
Funny thing about the show was everyone there was like ... old. Well, I'm old... but these people (at least all around me and Jess) were like, officially old. In their 60s old. It was kind of strange. Not the crowd I expected at all. There was a guy in front of us who was a dead ringer for my father in law. And as I was sitting there listening to Valerie sing and rock the hell out of her violin, I thought ... wow. I bet my in laws would actually like this. Too bad they're not going to Pittsburgh with the tour. I'd buy them tickets.
Afterwards, Jess and I decided that we would go get something to eat, so we headed over to the Rusty Hammer and downed some chow, chatted for a long time, and pulled into the driveway just as it was striking 12...
Sunday was a lot of football, and Geoff had a cub scout holiday party. He was one of only two webelos in attendance. He felt stupid and old, didn't have a buddy there to hang with and talk to... so we left after snack. I fell asleep during the Steelers/Pats game and then was completely unable to fall asleep last night, so I was up until 2am.
Today Geoff's got a half day, and I've got parent/teacher conference at 2:45pm. I asked for a later time... but I'm kind of glad it is early. I can get it over with.
And now a collection of useless observations:
I had a very very sharp booger in my nose the other day. When I breathed in, it cut me. When I exhaled, it cut me. If I pressed on the side of my nose, I thought I'd die. It hurt so much. Why do boogers turn titanium steel sharp inside of host nostrils? Heartbreaking.
There is a woman in my building who smokes. And you always know where she's been, because there is this reek that is left behind her everywhere. I know when she's been in the elevator before me, when she's been in the bathroom... when she's been in the parking garage. It is horrifyingly smelly.
She takes the elevator up one floor and DOWN one floor so she can go out and smoke. This kind of bothers me. I mean, I'm fat and all, but up one storey and down one storey, everyone should take the stairs. Unless you've had hip replacement surgery. And even then, that's part of your rehab. I don't understand anyone who takes mechanical transport up and down one level, unless they're Geoff and they think it is funny as all get out.
I kind of feel like I'm sitting in the calm before a storm right now, and am not sure where the storm may come from next. Do you ever get that feeling? Everything seems to be going smoothly, but you know in the back of your mind, you can just feel it, you know something huge is about to go down. And there is no way of knowing from what angle. It's kind of unnerving. I know some of it is my unpreparedness around the holidays. I have not done any Christmas shopping and Christmas Eve is two weeks from TODAY. It isn't just the holidays. It feels like something more and different and I can't pinpoint what it is.
Keri is looking for a permanent home for the Shakespeare camp. We got something about a curatorship for a DCR (Department of Conservation and Recreation) property that needs a total rehab. It would be great, awesome, amazing... and luckily we are in cahoots with someone who has looked at this property and is whetting down our enthusiasm or we'd be rushing headlong into oblivion right now with trying to plan how this would work. I mean, it would be amazing. An amazing place to have the camp, an amazing place to do performances. But it would cost like a million dollars to complete the renovations. And I don't even have $5000 for my furnace. I don't know how to start or run a capital campaign. I know I want to help do this and it would be a great opportunity... but reality bites me on the ass a lot and bursts my pie in the sky dreaming bubble. But, like I said, thank God we're working with someone who tempers our enthusiasm and keeps it real. Who knows -- maybe someday we'll find something perfect for Keri and the kids where they don't have to compete with heavy metal band concerts in the pavilion, or drunken wedding receptions... sigh.
There is this guy in a huge pick up truck who turns around in my driveway every single morning. He's out there right now. Every single day. It bothers me. I mean, it isn't like some person from away gets lost and needs to turn around because they missed their turn. This is a guy who does this daily. And I have no idea why. Dude. Stop it. Stop turning around in my driveway. The house across the street has a semi-circle driveway and no one lives there. Go. Turn around there. Go loop around our street, turn right and turn right again, all within a couple hundred feet and you know what? You've reversed direction. Stop pissing me off in the morning.
I'm not sure why that pisses me off so much.
Anyway... it took me the better part of two days sitting here to write this so I ought to post it and get on my way. Have a good day all.
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