I took a half day yesterday, and coming back to work was painful today

Things that are cracking my shit up today: this, and this, and also the fact that I just typed into Google, "How many cough drops can I eat before their healing properties are negated by sugar content?"

I couldn't find an answer.

I'm going to tell you anyway

You know how something important/exciting/interesting happens in your life, and you want to tell people about it, but you realize that it won't seem important/exciting/interesting to anyone but yourself? And then you go ahead and tell people about it anyway? Enter the following story.

My first car was an '89 Volkswagen Jetta. I loved my little car, and I still love the boxy design of the newer versions. The Jetta was an automatic transmission. My second and third cars were also automatic transmissions. I've never owned a manual transmission, and so I've never really learned how to drive one. Sure, I thought it'd be a useful skill to have down, but it was never a big deal. "Didn't your dad ever teach you how to drive a stick?" I've been asked. Truthfully, he probably asked me if I wanted to go out for lessons with him, and I was probably too busy wallowing in my teenage angst to even respond.

The Huz drives a stick shift, and years ago we had some driving lessons on country roads. I even drove the car around our town a few times, usually only killing it when I got nervous about other cars being around.

But that was back when we lived in a place that had rather flat geography. Now we live in a very hilly city, and I'm much more nervous about getting started uphill. We had some more lessons a few weeks ago, mostly for refreshing the physical movements of dealing with the clutch, and yesterday, for the first time, I drove in the city with a destination in mind rather than just driving aimlessly in parking lots or around the block near my house.

We headed out the door to get sushi, and he asked, "Quick driving lesson?" I hesitated, but agreed. So I cruised around our neighborhood for a little while, and then headed out onto a main road. Sitting at the stop sign with my turn signal on, I think I said outloud, "This is a bad idea." With picture perfect patience, The Huz reassured me. "You're doing fine."

"But I'm not ready," I whined.

"You're doing fine," he repeated. "I'll help you get out. You're fine after this next white car."

So I pulled out and everything was fine, because after getting started in first gear, I've got no problems. Naturally, my biggest fear is killing it at an intersection or somewhere that pisses people off and makes them honk at me and freaks me out so I kill it again. Okay, actually my biggest fear is having to start on a hill with a car too close behind me. Aaaaaaand of course the first time I drive out on the road, that's exactly what happened. I got stuck at a stoplight, heading uphill, and a car pulled right up on my ass.

"Oh shit. That car's too close. We're heading uphill. Oh shit. I'm not ready for this. This is a bad idea. Oh shit. I'm gonna hit him. Oh shit."

Calmly, amazingly, The Huz: "You're fine. The light's about to change. Start now. Quick off the brake. Start now. Just do it quick."

I'm slightly embarrassed to admit how hard my heart was pounding. It wasn't my car. I've never been in an accident. I'll look like an idiot. All good reasons to be apprehensive, in my book. But I did it. And I didn't hit the guy behind me. And I drove all the way to the restaurant.

As we got out of the car, I couldn't stop saying, "That totally freaked my shit out." And he was like, "Really?" And I said, "Oh yeah. My heart was beating so hard. It was probably as exciting as skydiving would be."

Pay Attention and Give a Shit

Words to live by that I am going to try harder to live by: Pay attention and give a shit.

Cracks me up: A Tired Teacher's Ideas for Classroom Projects

Also cracks me up: Toothpaste For Dinner

Seriously and totally cracks my shit up every time, but doesn't crack other people up when I tell them about it: Sausages!

This is the one about the time I went swimming in my basement

I've lived in my cute little house in my cool little college town for two years. The house was built in the '50s by a man and his new bride. It has hardwood floors, great kitchen cabinets, and plenty of space for two people. Despite the disturbing lack of electric sockets in most rooms, I really love the place. But with any old-ish house, things just start wearing out. When we first moved in, there was a flurry of maintenance calls since no one had lived in the house for a couple of years before us. The sump pump wasn't working properly in the basement, the pipes under the bathroom sink leaked, the gutters were clogged and created a pool of water on one side of the house that leaked into the basement, etc. But each time I called our landlord, someone in a truck with tools in hand was at our house practically before I hung up the phone. It's still like that after two years, and it is awesome how well we are treated as tenants.

One ongoing problem that we were able to mostly ignore until just a couple of days ago is that when the sump pump runs in the basement, water backs up into the kitchen sink. The pump is mainly only active when the washing machine empties into it, and so the kitchen sink only gets about half full for a few seconds before the water drains out, but it's kind of gross. And it's especially annoying when you're washing dishes. The pressure of the water backing up finally caused the pipes under the kitchen sink to leak all over the place, so I called the landlord. A maintenance man came while I was at work yesterday, and so I was all excited to do a load of laundry to test out the normal behavior of the pump. You will probably never hear me say I'm excited to do laundry again.

So I tossed in a load and skipped upstairs to do some dishes. The sump pump clicked on, and there was no back up. SUCCESS! But then after a while it seemed funny to me that I never heard the washing machine start the wash cycle. I peeked down the basement stairs and there was water everywhere. I have no idea why the washing machine never registered the water level as being full, but it kept on filling, for what I guess was 20 or 30 minutes, and the sump pump had never actually clicked on. I must've heard the furnace or some other noise and thought it was working. Can you see where this is going? The original problem was water backing up into the kitchen sink. I popped on my rain boots and waded into the water--a good six inches of water--and jiggled the syphon pipe. The pump kicked on and as it sucked water up and out, the kitchen sink about exploded. Water started seeping through the ceiling from the kitchen above, and seeping turned into pouring, and long story ended, there are maintenance men at my house cutting pipes open and fixing me a new sump pump.

Some might say that I am wasting money by paying rent instead of buying a house, but today, as I bask in the comfort of knowing skilled people are fixing major problems at my house for free, I'll just think of the monthly expense as affordable on-call maintenance. And it was actually pretty funny to see the cats' total disdain for the moat that was created around the stairs.