World on Fire
March 13, 2011
Where it all began...
Sometimes being a grown-up, pardon the expression, just sucks. For Mr. Blogling and myself, this weekend was one of those sucky times. Friday afternoon found us with four firetrucks in front of our house and our own little act of God in the basement (a fire and a flood! how does that even happen?) The culprit was a busted water heater, and it led to one unexpected night in a hotel, 8 hours of husband-labor installing a new water heater, 55 hours and counting without heat, spotty electricity, and the expenditure of many, many, many dollars. Overall: SUCKY.
Plus, my little family disaster interrupted my regularly scheduled blog programming by forcing me to flake on a long-overdue interview with mama vendor Amber Siepel. (I’m so sorry, Amber! I’ll make it up to you.) But, it does give me the opportunity to encourage some whining from you, dear readers. I want to hear about things that burst, broke, bled … anything. Misery loves company, so please — tell me about your own natural family disasters. Stories of your suffering will keep me warm at night. Goodness knows these space heaters aren’t doing the trick.
-Meryl at the Goose
P.S. There is a picture floating around somewhere of a night last winter when the entire Moreland family slept at The Goose to monitor some frozen sprinkler pipes. As soon as Kelly and I locate this photographic evidence, it will be yours for the viewing.
Thank You for Visiting the Mama Goose Blog! Unfortunately, this is no longer an active blog. 
March 13, 2011 at 10:06 pm
While putting up curtains on our 1st official nights as homeowners we managed to hit a wire in the wall, shorting the entire house of power. Now we have a live wire behind the walk and no landlord to call! Thank god for the electrician! To this day we don’t know why the wire was so close to the frame of the window and we don’t really know what it was powering, even after it was fixed. Misery does love comfort!
March 13, 2011 at 10:16 pm
That’s what I’m talking about, Kriss! THANK YOU.
March 14, 2011 at 6:34 am
basement flooded this week because friendly neighborhood squirrel plugged up the drain line that should have directed water elsewhere with nuts and leaves….
could have been much worse, but we caught it early…..
March 14, 2011 at 7:40 am
Well, we did have the radiator break last winter during a spell of zeroish weather and spent a couple days of eating and dressing by the fire place, but I would take that any day over a fire and a flood. Glad no one was hurt!! And, by the way, you are most definitely forgiven for “flaking.” While we were waiting, Charlie scored a red running suit and Ella scored a silky red Chinese top–they are both very pleased! Good luck with clean up and repairs–maybe something good will come of it yet?!
March 14, 2011 at 8:14 am
Our first winter out at the farm the freezing wind inexplicably came at the house from the southeast, blowing against the side of the house that, unbeknownst to us, had little to no insulation. Bathroom pipes froze and burst and all of a sudden it was literally pouring “rain” inside the house.
No money, knowing almost no one in the neighborhood, and no water since we had to shut off the whole house supply to stop the deluge. I was home full-time with a 13 month old in cloth diapers. Contemplating no laundry and no bathing was like a nightmare. Luckily, one of the two neighbors we knew directed us to the neighborhood plumber, “Twiggy”, who came over in the middle of the night and soldered the pipe so we could turn the water back on, then came the next day and made a permanent repair. Oh, and he never charged us, which is lucky since soon after that we started receiving food stamps and would still be paying him off today.
Six years later there’s still a hole in the ceiling showing the pipes. I’m afraid to close it for fear the heat won’t get to them. It’s ghetto and completely paranoid, but pouring rain inside your house will do that to you.