The Crazy, Insane, Long Weekend

Going through the drowned belongings in our basement took much long than DH and I originally estimated.

Why?

Because DH's dad slipped important documents in between his children's memorabilia.

Very important documents.

Like driver's licenses, tax returns, birth certificates, and social security cards. Some needed to be kept since they were DH's or his sisters'. Others should have been destroyed decades ago such Grandma T's personal info. One of our neighbors teased me about selling the info on the dark web, but after DH and I had our identities stolen once, I didn't find the joke quite as funny.

Anyway, we had to go through things carefully on two fronts. One was the important personal documentation. The other was the mold and mildew growing on things despite the colder than normal temps since the flooding.

(N95 masks are worth their weight in gold, people! Thankfully, I still had some leftover from the pandemic!)

Then we had to document all the losses. Part of what made me sick was losing a good chuck of the in-laws' movie collection. DH and I are both avid movie buffs. His parents were as well, and they had VHS tapes of a lot of classics.

(Don't laugh. I still have all the Star Trek:TOS and NextGen movies on VHS. And yes, we still have a couple of VHS players.)

The also had a bunch of Disney animated movies for when the grandkids visited. Some that are no longer available. I know in the age of streaming people don't like physical copies, but my Gen X heart loves them because I never know when some wet-behind-the-ears exec is going to take one of my favorites of their streaming service.

E.g. I can't find Dharma & Greg, one of my all-time favorite shows, on any streaming service at the moment. I'd barely gotten through the first season when Hulu yanked it last year.

In between the sorting and washing, I managed to get a few thousand words done. Now that the adjuster came to check out everything (no, it wasn't Jake, it was Zach from State Farm), we can move on with life.

That mean getting the damn HVAC motherboard replaced before we hit the 90s in Ohio! 

It's Friday Night

It's been a crazy week. We still need to sort through the last few boxes in the basement. We've got some help in dealing with the flooding issue, so we'll see if it pans out. I've got some words done, but I haven't met my weekly goal.

And it's ten 'til midnight. There's so, SO much to do.

Honestly, I'm just tired of my house being a total mess. Every time I get one thing accomplished, one room cleaned, hell, even one surface cleaned off, I turn around and everything's back to the mess it was. Living in a mess does things to my mind, and I simply cannot concentrate.

Tomorrow. I'm going to hide at Starbucks for a couple of hours until we go back to tackling the basement. I need to locate my N-95 masks (at least I know what room they are located in, if not the actually spot) before I head downstairs. Hopefully, those will lessen the fungi-caused headaches.

Keep your fingers crossed for me. 

Into the Flow

There's a certain magic that happens when I get deep into writing a story. DH calls it getting into the flow. I'm so involved in the the action and drama while I'm writing that nothing else matters. I can only get out if there's a violent bodily need, like eating or using the bathroom.

When I sprint with a friend in the evening, I often don't hear the ding of the timer. The Princess Pup can get on or off my lap without me realizing it. DH can be talking to me, and it doesn't register.

There's an episode of Mike & Molly where the family toys with Molly as she's in the zone while writing her book. While the scene is played for laughs, it perfectly captures the sensation.

I've been in the flow this week with A Cup of Conflict. It's a good thing, too, because I need to finish it. As a writer, I know I've been captured by it.

The problem is I'm going to resent having to sort and inventory everything in the basement from the flood this weekend. I also need to collect information for our insurance company to pursue subrogation rights pursuant to the damage.

With that, I realize I'm on the right track by writing, not practicing law.

Funny what convinces you that you are pursuing your life's path.

A Hell of a Monday

I was out of bed at 10:30 AM. I planned to head to Starbucks to write. The Great God Murphy must have heard my plan because it's now after 3:00 PM, and I haven't even repacked my travel laptop that was recharging overnight. The only work-related thing I've done so far is approve the eproof for Blood Sacrifice.

As I said in last Wednesday's post, I have to raise the price of print books because of the current tariff war. I'm also double-checking for typos I missed, updating the company name and copyright information, and updating the back matter. In one case, I even changed the back cover copy.

After a disastrous Thursday, we spent Friday and Saturday going through some stuff that was only partially submerged. DH has camera equipment sitting in plastic bins and on lids to dry out. I washed up most of the soaked towels we used to protect the hardwood floor in the family room.

Saturday night, DH went to the Flag City Phantoms game. I elected to stay home and try to catch up on some Angry Sheep work. I ended up talking to a writer friend, who's dealing with her own health issues, for an hour.

Saturday was also the birthday of our youngest niece. But between her and DH both working Saturday night, we celebrated her birthday at dinner in Applebee's on Sunday. (It's her new favorite place.)

My friend's mother passed away Saturday. The funeral has been pushed to next week because it's a holiday week here in the U.S.

"But, Suzan, all that happened over the weekend!" I hear you say. "What does that have to do with Monday?"

The reclaimation peeps from Service Master came to collect their fans bright and early this morning. They'll be back when we know what has to be trashed in the basement and what can be salvaged.

GK managed to lock himself out of both his email account and his Amazon account while trying to retrieve invoices required by the insurance company for his bed and mattress, which we know will have to be tossed. It took a little while to sort that out because his calls kept dropping.

By the time we got that handled, DH had the insurance company on the line after playing telephone tag with them on Friday.

I totally forgot to give the dogs their heartworm, flea, and tick preventives on Thursday. I remembered this morning, only to discover I forgot to pick up Simparica for the Princess Pup when I ran out in April. So I needed to run over to the vet's before they close.

And the kicker in all this mess? Our bank was bought and the conversion to the new bank took place over the weekend. So we had no idea where our back account stood. I had to put the damn groceries on the VISA. GK panicked about his paycheck getting deposited since we have a new routing number. I got him talked down, but I need to go through my business accounts and get all of those switched over to the new bank.

It doesn't look like I'll get a damn word written until after dinner tonight. Thank goodness, I've got plenty of leftovers in the fridge!

I really hope your Monday is less dramatic than mine!

Not Another Flood!

Darling Husband (AKA DH) woke up before dawn yesterday because he had to go to the bathroom. (The joys of being middle-aged, right?) He heard the sump pump alarm going off and went to the basement.

Despite all three sump pumps chugging away, one well was full, and the second one was filling rapidly. He ran upstairs and woke me. That was at 5:44 AM.

I threw on a t-shirt, sweats, and my slip-on Skechers. By the time I got down to the basement, the full wells were spilling across the basement floor. We started taking stuff upstairs, but we couldn't outrun the water.

DH was running back and forth in his bare feet. I ordered him to stay out of the water because Goddess only knew what was floating round  in that crap. He stayed above the middle of the stairs and I handed stuff to him.

By 6:04 AM, I gave up. The water was at my ankles. My shoes were full. My feet were itching terribly from whatever was in the flood water. I took off my shoes, left them on the top step, and went to wash the gunk off my feet.

Poor DH had a bunch of his deceased parents' memorabilia and his old toys he wanted to keep in the basement. Stuff that we didn't have room for anywhere else in the house. Plus, all of Genius Kid's (AKA GK) furniture and home stuff were stored down there while he's stationed overseas.

Luckily, it was a weekday, so we had companies there almost as soon as they opened. A HUGE shout-out to the peeps from  EverDry Waterproofing, Bowers Heating and Cooling, and Service Master for responding as fast as they did. We're still waiting for the insurance adjuster from State Farm to come by, which will probably be Monday or Tuesday.

Thankfully, the water didn't go past the second from bottom step this time. But a 1400 sq, ft, open space filled at the rate of one inch every three minutes before the sump pumps could catch up. That's a hell of a lot of water to remove.

Despite all the precautions and upgrades we did after the 2021 basement flood, the pond in the subdivision behind us overflowed. Again. Yes, we're looking into our legal remedies. That's all I can say at this point.

This was not how I wanted my week to end. I was on a good frickin' role with A Cup of Conflict before all the shit happened. Losing two days dealing with the mess was not on my to-do list for this week.

But that's life, right?

It didn't help to learn a good friend's mother is in hospice. It's a matter of days. Which mean another funeral soon. This one I won't resent because this friend has always been there for me.

And life goes on...