Life Is But A Drink

The weekend came.  And the weekend went.  In the blink of an eye, it seems.  Oh well, hello Monday.  So we meet again.

You may recall that, awhile ago, I took my camera around the house one night and took a photo of what everyone was doing to give you a real-live glimpse into life in my house (see here).  Well, last night, I decided to do it again.  So, here you go – 8:15 pm up in my crib.

I was baking cupcakes in the kitchen.  My son’s birthday is on Tuesday and he has 27 (good golly!) kids in his class.  Which means baking and frosting 27 cupcakes.  The idea of doing all of that on a Monday night after work, in addition to wrapping up all of the boy’s presents, caused warning bells and visions of 2:30 am to dance in my head.  So, I decided to get a jumpstart on the process and bake up the cakes last night.  Leaving time for frosting and present wrapping tonight.

(By the way, while I was baking cupcakes, I was also cleaning up from dinner.  We made this Creamy Tuscan Pasta Sauce that I got from Mel’s Kitchen Cafe (see here) last night and it was divine, so give it a shot.  It really is only a 20 minute recipe, although I dirtied up quite a few pots, bowls, colanders, etc. while making it so it did take quite a bit of time to clean up.)

The kids were coloring/word seeking in the kitchen with me.  In their jammies.  They’d just finished their bath and had a little time to kill before bed.  Batman rocks a word seek, in case you were wondering.  The other one just likes to scribble a few things on a page in one of her coloring books and then move on to the next page.  While she half-dangles out of her chair.  And reports to me about every three seconds about what she is coloring now and what color she is coloring it.  Mom, I’m coloring the butterfly’s wing purple.  It’s going to be so beautiful!…Mom, the cloud is going to be red because it is the silliest cloud ever… Mom, the flower is yellow.  Yellow is sometimes my favorite color.  Except that it’s not because my favorite color is pink and purple sometimes too.  But not yellow.  

My husband was doing something in the office/piano room that involved a piano, an iPad, a pencil, and a score.  I’m not sure.  I didn’t ask.  But it looked serious.

The dog was stretched out and relaxing on the floor.  Always.  Except when he’s not.

I found both of the cats asleep in the living room.  I was able to snap this photo of Tuck, lounging away on one of the chairs.  I wasn’t able to grab a shot of Nip because, at this point, my daughter was following me around wondering what I was doing.  When she saw me taking a photo of Tuck, she asked me if I was also going to take a picture of Nip and, as she asked (shrieked) this, she promptly flung her entire body at Nip (who was sleeping on the couch) and this sent Nip (who doesn’t like being anywhere in the general vicinity of my daughter – because she frequently shrieks and flings) sprinting out of the room for his dear life.

Not anymore, apparently.  Thank you, my dear.  Now please go back to your coloring.

We’ve previously established that I am not a professional bricklayer (see here).  Well, now you can add plumber to the list of things that I am not.  {Sad face}

You may recall that my surprisingly Hulk-ish husband ripped the kitchen faucet off with his bare hands not too long ago (see here). And as one who generally likes the idea of having a working faucet in my kitchen, I went out the next morning and bought a new faucet. I almost opted for one of those new faucets that will turn on when you touch the back of it with your hand or is motion sensing, but then I didn’t because * I don’t know * really?  Am I so lazy that I can no longer turn on my own faucet? Instead, I went for some middle-of-the-road Moen faucet that looked pretty.  No fancy bells and whistles (although it does have three types of spray and a rather exciting pull out nozzle and that anti-spot finish which is pretty darn spectacular…). 

And, since my husband was going to be tied up with work stuff until rather late, I came home a couple of hours early from work with the intent of  installing the new faucet.  Surprise!  Look how amazing I am!  Best wife ever!

I mean, I consider myself to be a rather capable woman.  I’m handy (ish).  Really, I am.  I got this, I thought.

I thought wrong.

I got the water turned off.  Yay!  I unhooked the water lines.  Score! And I unscrewed a couple of screws.  Woo-hoo!  

But then there was that giant nut.  That giant jerk of a nut.  The one that actually attached the faucet to the sink.  And that, my friends, was on there good.  Really good.  So good that I couldn’t get it off no matter how hard I tried.  And, believe you me, I tried everything.  Swearing.  Praying.  Contorting my body in ways that I had no idea that it could contort.  I even made a middle-of-the-madness trip to Home Depot to get a basin wrench, figuring that would be the magic sauce that enabled me to get the thing off.  (The Internet sort of promised me as much.) But, alas, I am now the proud owner of a basin wrench that did me exactly no good.  No surprises there.   Bad Internet. 

I spent two and a half hours trying to get that darn jerk of a nut off.  And it hadn’t budged a bit.  Not one iota.  #plumbingfail.  And then I had to get the kids, so I left the sink and the faucet and my pride behind to attend to those parenting responsibilities.  And I took the kids out to dinner because, I mean, the whole kitchen sink is pretty fundamental to cooking and cleaning up in the kitchen. Besides, I didn’t want to be anywhere near the darn thing because it was mocking me.  Really, it was.  And I was desperately in need of a margarita.  On the rocks.  With salt. 

When my husband got home a bit later that night, he picked up where I left off.  He swore.  He prayed.  He contorted.  He tried the basin wrench.  But he couldn’t get the darn old faucet off either.  (There was a little vindication for me in his failure, you know.  I’d never admit it, but there was.)

Ultimately, his frustration led him to just rip the entire sink up out of the countertop so he could get better leverage on the nut.  It finally gave.  When it was off, we did a little dance around the kitchen.  Because victory is so sweet.  And because we were deliriously tired because, at this point, getting the old faucet off had consumed a good 4 1/2 hours of our lives. 

Anyway, the good news is that we like the new faucet.  It functions (plus!) and it’s way prettier than the last one.  Hurrah!

Guess who’s getting a new kitchen faucet today?  Apparently me.

Last night, I got home to an empty house.  My hubby and kids were over at a friend’s house, and I’d stayed late in Washington, D.C. to meet up with a friend for a drink (or two).  I came in, dropped my stuff in the front hall, and headed to the kitchen to wash my hands and found this…

Yes, that’s my kitchen faucet.  Broken off.  And laying on the counter.

Needless to say, I couldn’t wash my hands in the kitchen sink.  And, needless to say, it was a bad idea to turn the water on just to see what happened.  Because you knew that water was going to spray in your face.  And all over the kitchen floor.

I still haven’t gotten the full rundown on what happened.  But it appears that my husband has developed some sort of Hulk-like super strength and can now rip faucets off with his bare hands.  Or something.

And I guess I’m getting a new kitchen faucet today.