The unserious stuff

I think I’m being followed by a black cloud or something.

When I got home from my Thanksgiving trip to NJ, I discovered that my cable box/DVR was dead. Then, yesterday, while I was at the chiropractor, the machine that they attach to your muscles zapped me with a painful jolt that made me yell “OW!” loud enough that the chiropractor came running.

Then, last night, my fireplace just—stopped. It was running, then it wasn’t. The pilot wouldn’t light, nothing. But no gas was coming out.

Today, when the cable guy came over to bring me a new box/DVR, his belt buckle broke.

I’m starting to wonder if something followed me home from NJ. Although come to think of it, it’s probably from Delaware. Delaware sucks, and I managed to beat the toll coming back from NJ. (You get off at exit 1B southbound, go to Christina/Christiana Parkway, make a left, follow it to the end, make another left, and get back on 95 past the $4 toll and give Delaware a great big Nelson laugh.)

That’s right. I blame Delaware.

I got the pilot light to work in the fireplace, and read the manual long enough to realize there’s no way in hell I am playing around with it. It’s a gas fireplace with an electric pilot and an electric switch that turns on the gas. That’s a combination that spells really bad news if you don’t know what you’re doing. And I don’t. So tomorrow, I call a fireplace guy and have him come in and fix and clean the fireplace. My gas company reduced its rates though February (at least), and the gas fireplace really warms up the Great Room nicely—and that’s where I watch TV in the evenings. Then, the heat from the gas fireplace warms the second story nicely, which is where I go to bed after watching TV.

You should see how I’ve situated The Chair that Swallows You Whole. It’s a few feet from the fireplace, centered directly across from the TV. If only I could roast chestnuts in the fireplace, it’d be absolutely perfect.

But boy, I am loving my new home. Loving it. I love being able to drive into the garage in the pouring rain, wait for the Jeep roof to stop dripping, and get out completely dry instead of having to rush through the wind and the rain. I love having absolute quiet during the workday, instead of having to listen to the neighbors drive past with their car stereos blasting so loud that my walls shake. Or having to listen to my neighbors’ marital troubles (and neighbors in those apartments always settled their problems with screaming fights). I love watching Tigger run down the stairs when he wants to play and lie sideways on a step, ears down, waiting for me to throw a ping pong ball or his koosh. I love watching Gracie stick her head and shoulders through the railing of the landing to see what I’m doing, in hopes that I’ll come upstairs and give her skritches. I love watching the cats sleep in the sunlight as it moves across my room, or come to me in the office to see if I’m ever going to stop working and start paying attention to them.

And I love that I’m having people over again, so that at any given time, my home needs only about a half-hour’s prep before being completely respectable for visiting. This weekend, Jake is going to spend some time with Aunt Meryl because his younger brother’s delayed birthday party (sleepover, of course) is going to take Sarah and Larry’s attention, so they asked if I can take him for the evening and run him out to synagogue the next morning for a bar mitzvah. Next Friday, I have volunteered to take all four children so that Larry and Sarah can have a birthday present of a night to themselves. I would not have been able to do that in my old apartment. But I can do it in my new home.

I am going to be tired and a bit frazzled a week from Saturday, after the kids are gone. But I’m going to be loving my new home.