on why lukewarm tap water in arizona may not be as bad as i had once thought it was.

{here we are in less stressful days, on bennigan's 31st birthday, pre-move.}

we are here, folks!

hot diggity dog i never thought i'd see the day when i would be sitting down again, let alone on my couch again.  it is a beautiful thing.  beautiful i say.

anyone who has moved knows that moving.  is.  exhausting.  in fact i need a nap just mentioning the word.  

moving.  

{yaaaawwwnnn.}

but for us, moving also never comes without some sort of adventure.  our adventures were more traumatic to me the last time around, when i thought we would never be leaving from the bermuda triangle that was the group home.  then when our possessions didn't show up on time, and we were sleeping on the floor for a couple of days at the new apartment.

so for this go 'round, i was already on my guard, ready to expect the unexpected.  luckily i was emotionally and mentally prepared.  unfortunately, ben was not.  the poor fella thought this would be a smooth transition.  doesn't he know yet that we are ben & lynsey, who never do things smoothly?  the "easy" award goes to that other guy, not to us.  but that's okay, i accept and embrace it.  {well not embrace so much.  but accept.}

anyway, we had help packing the truck in and help unloading it, and just when we got comfortable and thought we might be through the nervewracking-what-will-go-wrong-this-time period, we realized:

the gas man didn't come!

{side note:  do the gas men know that this is their nickname?  "the gas man?"  i would need to feel very passionately about pursuing this profession in order to take on that nickname.  just sayin'.}

so back to the point.

do we all know what the gas man does?  if you answered that he turns on the hot water, you would be correct.  if you also answered that he turns on a gas stove {which we now have} then you would be correct twice.  aren't you awesome?

ben came flying through the garage, ticked off, announcing in a loud voice,

"THE GAS MAN DIDN'T COME YESTERDAY!"

see what i mean?  ben was not emotionally and mentally prepared.  i, on the other hand, was pleasantly surprised.

"is that all?"  i asked him sweetly, my eyes wide with shock.

'"is that all?  ALL?"  his face started to get red.  his arms were flailing around.  luckily we now have a big family room so that i didn't fall victim to his upset-ness.

"i am CALLING SOMEONE.  CALLING.  SOME.  ONE.  RIGHTNOWIAMCALLINGSOMEONERIGHTNOW."

and that's just what benjamin strader did.  

unfortunately, the woman behind the gas man customer service phone number didn't give a hoot.

"i'm sorry sir, but it's saturday.  the earliest one of our gas men could be there is on monday," she explained with an even, i-don't-give-a-hoot tone.

well.  ben is the cheese man and that totally supersedes the gas man, so he informed her that he wanted to file an official complaint.

and then i'm pretty sure she took a little pleasure in this reply,

"sure, sir.  and you can do just that on monday, when our office is open."

poor ben angrily pushed the END CALL button and turned to me, with flames in his eyes.  so i did what any good wife of the cheese man would do, and offered him a cheesy teesy {to those not privy to "cheese jargon" it is also known as a tortilla with cheese melted on it} so he could eat away his emotions.

we went for 2 days without hot water, and our kids got the royal treatment for their baths.  and the definition of "royal treatment" is heating up bowl after bowl of water in the microwave so that they wouldn't catch hypothermia as we scrubbed the nastiness and grub off after the move.  

i'll admit it, i went for as long as i could without taking a shower.  but by sunday afternoon i couldn't take it anymore.  there was no amount of perfume that could help me, so i cowboyed up and prepared myself for what every teenage boy has probably had to face at some point in their lives.

a cold shower.

but the good news?  

well on a normal day i can't stand the fact that i'd just like a nice, cool glass of water from the faucet on a hot summer's afternoon in arizona and instead have to quickly gulp down lukewarm tap water which is just never as refreshing.

however, arizona's inability to contain a cooled water pipe system served me well during my shower.  it was shocking at first, i'm not going to lie.  a gasp escaped my lips as i stepped in.  but after about 30 seconds or so it became more bearable.  that doesn't mean i took my time, oh no.  i hustled as quickly as i could to get out.  but every now and then, i would get a taste of real warmth in the water.  kind of like being in the shallow end of a pool, surrounded by kids who didn't know how to control their bladder functions while swimming.  {nice visual?}

well we survived it.  no hot water, no ability to even heat up water on our stove or cook anything for the weekend.  and we are slowly but surely getting every room together.  of course almost every room is decorated, because that's the way i roll....and eventually everything else will be put away too.

no pictures yet, but they will come along soon.

and can i just say for a moment?

that i am actually grateful that we have had our struggles.  that things like getting into a house haven't been easy, and didn't come quickly.  because i have felt since we've moved in that we are actually renting a country instead of a house.  there's so much room!  my kids have more than a 5ft x 5 ft area to walk/play/fight in!  they have their own rooms and we have an extra room as an office for ben!  

it is wonderful.  and i am grateful.  not that i completely love to struggle along and survive in cramped quarters, but this new place has just brought so much happiness that i don't know would have been there if we had had access to it all along.  

can't taste the sweet without the bitter, right?

a lesson i have been continually taught.



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