Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Caves, Hitler, and a Dash of Perspective

One Gigantic Freaking Hole
It's gotten to the point where I'm a little bit scared to come home after work - seems like everyday brings a new surprise as they continue to destroy and then rebuild the kitchen area in our house, and yesterday was no exception. The plumber was planning on digging up a small section of the floor so he could reroute some pipes that weren't fitting into the wall the way they should - which wasn't supposed to be a big deal, except that as he was jack-hammering away at the floor to create a small hole, he noticed that the cement was falling into the hole and disappearing. So he stopped and took a closer look, and lo and behold, what to his wondering eyes should appear, but a gigantic freaking hole underneath our house. So when I got home and asked how things were going, I was invited to poke my head into the hole in the floor, and what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a gigantic freaking hole under our house. And I do mean gigantic. This hole is, no exaggeration, large enough for me to fit in, and Katie to fit in, and Connor and Carrie to fit in - all at the same time, and there would probably be some room left over. And that's just the part we can see - we won't know for sure how large it is until we open up the floor in order to take a better look. So I guess we'll need to fill in the hole before it swallows up the entire house (although that would probably make the local news and could earn me my ten minutes of fame) which will involve tearing out a sizable portion of floor, filling in the hole with dirt and concrete, and rebuilding the torn out floor. Connor, on the other hand, thinks we should keep it the way it is - I guess he's a big fan of caves in general, and having his own personal cave might be some kind of weird status symbol in his mind. Plus, for some reason, he thinks Hitler is buried under our house now, and that we'll be famous for that (I guess we probably would be famous if Hitler was actually buried down there, but I have my doubts). Meanwhile, word has apparently gotten out in the construction-crew world, because we've had a whole bunch of guys who have stopped by to take a look at the gigantic freaking hole under our house, and every single one of them has scratched his head and said, "I've never seen anything like that before." But other than having a gigantic freaking hole under our house and a missing kitchen, everything is going swimmingly. And all of this started with getting a new dishwasher.

On the other hand…
In the spirit of the holiday season we're now in the midst of, I'm thankful for many things in my life, including the fact that I even have a home to give me so many headaches - and a job - and a mostly healthy family. So everytime I start to feel like the Gods are conspiring against us, I remind myself that this might be a hassle, but it could be ever so much more worse than it is.

Ultra Update
I officially started my training for the 50-miler this week, with a Saturday 16-miler followed by a Sunday 18-miler that included a few miles on trails. Saturday was surprisingly easy, but Sunday was a bit of a challenge as my legs were definitely feeling the distance towards the end. And now that I'm looking at my mileage, I think I'm might be hitting the 2010-mile mark even earlier than I was planning - maybe even by the end of this week.

That's all I can think of for now, so we'll cut it a little short this week and end by hoping that your turkeys remain stuffed, that your cream remains whooped, and your potatoes are mashed to perfection.

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