Down in a Hole

Since two weeks ago tomorrow, we knew in our heart of hearts that something like this lurked four or five feet below. The city fretted, argued that it was ground water, leaned on their shovels, destroyed a good swath of the yard (and lots of sprinkler pipe) looking in the wrong place with a backhoe. They chatted and leaned while waiting for backhoe repairs (first a tire and then "it just kept dying"). Then they went away and sent someone to take a sample to the lab to 'show it wasn't city water.' That guy (this was Monday) said, "By golly, it's a water main leak...I can't believe they couldn't hear it." He promised they'd come yesterday and fix a great swath of pipe so it wouldn't just happen again. So they came today (not yesterday) and what did they replace? The absolute minimum to stop the leak shown above. Now we have a mess, hundreds of dollars of sprinkler and lawn damage and a piece of our driveway knocked out.

Is that the only reason I'm down in the dumps? Not really. The holiday season has succeeded in depressing me before it began. Something about needing to buy gifts when I need to throw away most everything in the house. I tried to get a jump on the season (and get some birthday gifts off) but I arrived at my favorite pack and mail store at 3:30 and they closed at 3PM...until Monday.

And each time I think my mouth will quit its weird burning...back it comes. Maybe it's getting better and maybe not.

Other than that stuff? I had a great day, thanks. And I'm making a list of things to be thankful for. And it will be a long one, of course.