I am a water Princess

My family and I just moved!
The move was fraught with complications, from cleaning out mouse-infested memory boxes caused by the Great Mouse War of 2012, dolled up to the nines in our homemade Hazmat suits(I should have taken pictures, we looked like we were in the middle of a chemical spill), to a round robin of the stomach flu the likes of which our plumbing (and the houses) will never forget.
But we made it through the wilderness. Yes, we made it through.
Our new home is Gorgeous.
It's spacious!
It's evenly heated!
It's got bedrooms for everyone!
It's got new carpet!
And Cupboards; Oh the Cupboards! You wouldn't believe!!! So much built in storage and doors to storage and closets, and- well, you get the picture. And for us to be excited about such mundane luxury items as space and storage and heat and carpet tells you the little I'm willing to share about our old crap-hole.

So what do we do to make this New Manse feel like home?
We flood it. Twice.
Well, actually neither of the floods were caused by me, you are supposed to find all the little faults in a rental property in the first month of living there, right?
We've only been here 5 days you say?
Well, kids, pets and Husbands are bound to find the faults a little faster, right?
Let me paint a picture:
Our first night, supper is being made, shiny tired happy faces bouncing around the basement play-room.
My husband goes to pour himself a glass of tap water(that's right! from the tap!) in the kitchen. He notices a trickle from the bottom of the nozzle.
'Oh, the washer must be off kilter, I'm going to get that fixed right now'
He gets his screwdriver, unscrews the lever, takes the cap off.
The kitchen explodes.
There is a 3 foot jet of water screaming out of where the tap should have been, my husband is soaked, hands frantically trying to plug the geyser, screaming at me to shut the water off. I scoot under his legs like some backwards game of leapfrog, open the cabinet under the sink and try to find the shut off valves. Only they aren't there. Well, they are, but they've been welded open. So I run downstairs, vaguely aware that he's yelling at me that it shuts off  UNDER THE FUCKING SINK and I'm in the area where all the pipes go, and I can't find a shut off valve, and I see a red tap, and I shut it down, and there's still water screaming out of the pipe. So I run back upstairs and yell at him that THERE'S NO WAY TO SHUT THE WATER OFF, WE'RE GOING DOWN!!!!! and he shouts at me to get over here and hold the water down, I'll do it myself, and then I'm holding a Fucking Cold gush of water, and I'm trying to use my hands to curve this fierce jet back into the sink while he looks under the sink, and then, he too runs downstairs, and then back up he comes and -CALL THE LANDLORD! CALL THE LANDLORD!
So we tag off on the water bending, and I attempt to dial the landlords number with freezing fingers on a TOUCHSCREEN PHONE because our landline isn't coming in for two more days, and I finally get the number right and call, and it rings once, twice, thrice, four times and finally he answers, and in my best professional voice I ask him how he's doing, and he asks the same,(while my husbands stares on through the water haze in his best incredulous look) and I say, well, I need you to tell me where the Water shut off valve is. And he says oh dear, what's wrong? And at this point I want to scream that I should be wearing my life vest right about now, but I just say that the kitchen tap has decided to stop working properly, and we need to shut the water down Now, here's my husband(since he was the one who started all this), and then I give the phone to him and grab the jet and push, and back downstairs he goes, and then the water slows to a trickle-hah-and then it is off, and my once clear kitchen is now quite sloshy, but I have just unpacked the towels and so I grab all of them, and thank-fucking-goodness we have a new HE Super Capacity washer and dryer right off the kitchen.
And then the doorbell rings. And in comes this old farmer and he asks us if we found the water shut off (I guess my husband kind of just hung up on our landlord), and he tells us that he got a call from the landlord (who happens to live on a farm 10 minutes away) and that since he was in town he could come over to check and see if we were okay. And then the Landlord himself shows up, and we all have a good laugh over us being all wet, and our silliness. One of the perks of small town living is that everyone knows everyone, and everyone is really helpful, but also they talk. And now we are not just the new people, but we are the new people who managed to flood our house the first night in. Right on.
Nothing got wrecked.
Nothing leaked.
Supper didn't even burn.
Husband went out at 8 at night and drove the 45 minutes into the city to get a new kitchen tap, since there wasn't much left of the old one, and the kids got to eat their first supper in the new house in our (now) Very Clean Kitchen.
We got the water turned back on around 10.
We started drinking about the time the kids went to bed.
There was a lot more swearing in that story than I let on, but I didn't want to frighten anyone.
Oh, and that red tap turned out to be for the water heater, husband managed to catch that before we broke other things.
Check back tomorrow for the Second Flood story.

My favorite winter tradition

I consider myself a connoisseur of Massage therapy.
Well, of any kind of spa massage anyways.
See, I have a little bit of a buggered up back, around the shoulder/neck line, so every year when the cold hits, my shoulder acts like an old guys balls in -20 weather, and tries to escape into my neck. funny image, that. but true. So every year, I make sure I have a couple bills set aside for whoever I find to be the most convincing in their coaxing of my shoulder back into it's original position. Sometimes it works, and I find myself grateful to the Master Negotiator of Muscle. Then, at other times, I find myself ruing the day I ever came across that coupon for
'Free Hot Hamburger with Massage, courtesy of The Ligament Lounge!'

This year was so exceptional as to have a little of both worlds. I was lucky enough to bugger up my shoulder early in the season, so I didn't have to deal with all those crazy outta-control x-mas shopper-extraordinaries, and their pulled hamstrings or loose wallets. ( I hate having to tip extra to someone that didn't do the job properly. Just because that last two people in line to pay have each slapped down 20's, a gift basket, and some homemade cocoa, doesn't mean that I'm gonna do the same.) So I try out this new place, advertised in the phone book as the only physio- centre that hires only seasoned-Rmt's, which sounds both edible and medical, so I give it a try.
Glad I did too, fantastic place. Ended up having to go back only on more time, it was fantastic, and really reasonably priced! But if you think I'm gonna tell you the name of the place, tough luck.
My massage therapists! BAck OFF!


Kay. Now to the second place, and I'll gladly tell you the name in just a minute. So I got this awesome gift certificate from work, got it last x-mas, and it was about to expire, so I thought, gee what better way to start the holiday season than to get a relaxation package, which is a 45 min. relaxing full body massage, and a paraffin hand and foot treatment. For those who don't know what that is, I'll also get to that in a minute. So, I book the appointment for the day after my certificate expired, still got to use it though, and wait dutifully for the day when my back shall be relaxed and my hands paraffined.

Kay. Firstly, I did not receive a 24-hour reminder call, so I didn't actually remember that I had the appointment until about an hour before. that was fun. Found a sitter though, (my casual sitter fuckin rocks!) so I made it there with two minutes to spare.

Secondly, I was given the only massage room without a proper massage bed, so I had to make do with lying face down with a pillow on what felt like a hospital gurney, not just that, but a FOLDABLE hospital gurney. Lemme tell you, when yer nekked, you don't want to be feeling the metal hinges to your bed in the most uncomfortable spots. I swear, I'm sure they had a couple of teenage stoners come up with with the mechanics of that bed.
dumb ass1-"heh, it's cool that the principal let us outta detention to make up for the shop class project."
dumb ass2-"Heh. yeah. the Principal's a tool. heheh"
dumb ass1-"heeeyyy!!! wouldn't it totally rock if we put these cold metal hinges like, right where the girl's boobs are? then we could totally see some frozen tats! heh. heh."
dumb ass2-"Doofus! we aren't gonna see any of the chicks who'll be lying on this thing. duh. dumb ass"
dumb ass1-"ohh,... oh well, it'd still be cool."
dumb ass2-"no man! we already failed this once. dude I can't fail, or my parents won't buy me that x-box."
dumb ass1-"come on!"
dumb ass2-"heh. heheh. alright, let's do it!"
dumb ass1&2-"hehehe....he."
I rest my case.

Thirdly, I happened to get the one girl who they just let past the training stage, so she was pretty new. Didn't understand the concept of 'relaxation', you know, real talky and such, and the point got moot anyway, cuz as soon as she started, you could tell she was still doing the 'audible counting in the brain thing'. So I started to count along with her.
Left-side down, 1-2-3-4-5-6-pause..... drag hands up middle, right-side down, 1-2-3-4-5-6-pause..... drag hands up middle, repeat.
At one point she even asked if I knew the technique she was using, cuz I guess at some point the counting-along-in-my-head-thing kinda turned verbal, unbeknownst to me. I just said no, and went back to my counting.

I'll leave the paraffin for tomorrow, as this post is already getting too long. I know I said I'd tell you in a minute, and it will be for me, but everyone else will have to be patient.