Crazy Week

Last Sunday at 12:30 PM we got our Covid and flu shots at the CVS in Blackstone. My arms were very sore that night and the next day so rather than swimming laps I worked on the course for my First Aid and Basic Life Support training.

I reminded Bill that we had to get the boiler ready to be turned on because the end of the week would be in the 30's at night. Monday night after school Bill began working on the low water shut off switch mechanism in preparation. But then he said something is wrong, the fuse keeps getting tripped.

Time to go to bed and call the boiler man in the morning. The next day Bill phoned from school. We think something electrical is malfunctioning with our boiler. "You will be charged, because it's electrical!" The secretary at the oil company warned.

The company has been bought up by a big company so now we no longer have these things covered on our plan. "It's in the handbook!" she quipped. Do we even have a plan? We'd better read the handbook. What the hell is the name of the company now anyway? 

Tuesday I was home all day again taking the online course exams while my sore shoulders healed. The doorbell rang and it was Nate the boiler man. He's a Friendly Giant! He's 6 foot 6 inches. Six inches taller than my basement ceiling. He came in and tilted his head and found the problem. It was a squished wire from when we took apart and reassembled the low water shut off switch. Even Nate had to assemble it twice because the first time it leaked water.

Tuesday evening

After dinner but just before leaving to teach swimming I made a small mug of Ovaltine. I suggested Bill have a taste He said no thanks. I said You like malt in beer but I like malt in Ovaltine. Have a taste. He had a taste and fainted. I was right there next to him so I caught him under the armpits. He remained vertical. It was a vertical faint. When he came to I suggested he sit down and I explained what happened. He said really? I thought I was having a conversation.

I was ready to call off my teaching due to this medical emergency. He said No, I'll be fine, go teach. I told my supervisor what happened and she said, Go home it's fine we can cover for you. I said, let me call to check on him since I have a few minutes before my class starts. Bill said he was fine and he sounded good. He was reading about vasovegal syncope and realized that he had been dehydrated and on his feet all day and then stayed late on his feet for a meeting after school. Ever since his fancy Contigo thermos was stolen 2 weeks ago he has had trouble finding a workable solution for staying hydrated. All of our other thermoses don't stay as cold or they tip over and spill. I said order a few! (My Jewish impulse to buy in bulk). He found one at a good price and ordered it.

UPDATE: We picked it up! The hydration has resumed and Bill feels fine.

  * * *

(a week earlier)

So last night after teaching 2 classes and coming home at 9:30 which is very late for me but a normal Tuesday, a big black pickup truck was in my parking space in front of my garage. I honked two times. A man came running up to my driver's side window from the street and said, I was just helping my fiance with her car. I had noticed a man on the street with a navy blue jeep hood open leaning into the engine compartment as I drove in. I said, Okay, sorry. He was ready to move his truck. I said, By the way do you know you can exit out the other driveway? He said, I used to live here, I know my truck won't fit. Okay, I said, and moved so he could get out. I pulled up next to my neighbor's car and then after the truck left I backed up while turning and heard the sound of breaking plastic. Oh no! I pulled into my spot and got out and my car was fine. I looked and the trailer that has been abandoned back here with an old motor boat on it and 2 flat tires was what I hit. The metal bracket holding the right side reflector tail light on the trailer bent and the reflector light broke off. I picked it up and two wires dangled. I put it in the boat. Bill said don't worry about it. I do feel awful even though this has been junked here and never used for many years and most likely destined for the dump. We've seen the owner once, years ago, pumping air into the tires, but still, I do feel bad. I damaged something. It was an accident. Bill will take a look at it at some point maybe who knows we can get the replacement reflector and bend back the metal and hook it back up.

UPDATE: Yesterday, a week after the incident, I was at the computer taking an online course for work when I heard a godawful sound. It was my neighbor Rick, the landlord's maintenance man. He was sawing the fiberglass boat into 2 foot pieces to fit into the dumpster. When I looked outside a few hours later the trailer was gone too. He probably wheeled it into his garage to rebuild it and presumably sell it. So my damage has been absolved in a sense, a week after the incident. My guess is the original owner of the boat and trailer stopped paying rent for the parking space years ago and the absentee landlord just learned that it was still here in his parking lot. I'm just glad I don't have to look at my mistake every day. 

 * * *

I got in my car after teaching Tuesday night and there was a weird earthy overly intimate mushroomy chemically rotting dirty socks smell as I drove home blasting the heat. I convinced myself it must be rotting leaves from parking under our gorgeous maple tree. The scent was even weirder the next day. So when my husband came home Wednesday night I asked him if he would sit in the car while I ran the car engine fan and see if he smelled it. Yeah, it's  awful! he agreed. Most likely a dead animal. We looked under the hood, but found nothing. We called Sam our mechanic and he said I could come by the next day after I teach. So I did. Sam could not smell it. I was glad my husband had because I fear being seen as a hypochondriac when it comes to doctors, dentists, and auto mechanics.

Sam told me to buy some Lysol and spray it into the two large vents on the hood, below the windshield. Do it for 15 seconds. Then run the fan. At first I was thinking of Pine Sol. Do I pour it in?  He said, No, the spray. Do you know Lysol? I was picturing Pine Sol. I realized this on the way home. My fear of appearing stupid made me stupid.

I came home and made a peanut butter sandwich and then I walked 4 blocks to Walgreen's and bought a can of Lysol. I sprayed the stuff and ran the fan and my car smelled like decomposing mouse sprayed with Lysol.

Today as I drove I opened all the car windows, aimed the vents away from me, blasted the heat and covered my nose with my neck gator, as I drove 40 miles an hour to work.

The car smell made me think of a dank hospital basement or a tenement hallway of a building where smokers live. I imagined a brown painted hallway with clear plastic treads on the steps where a plump landlady with hair gathered into a tiny gray bun is wearing a flowered apron with big pockets and red cotton rick rac zig zag trim. She is mopping the floor (with Pine-Sol) to mask the smoke smell. She is annoyed but polite. English is not her first language.

All of these associations came from the chemical smell. I drove to work keeping all 4 windows open and ran the heat and the fan. I wore my worn out leather dog-walking gloves red fleece hat and red neck gator. It was 60 degrees out. People might  have thought I was crazy. Who cares. I have a dead animal in my heater box. I parked in the sun hoping it might speed the process of decomposition and remedy the situation. I am a nose. I can smell a 200 year old molecule of cat pee in a historic house. I will keep the windows open when I drive for as long as I can.

Today was the first day with my new student. I was told her name is Jen. At 10:15 I looked around for a woman ready for a swim lesson. A woman walked up to the pool. Are you Jen? Yes. I'm your teacher today. I didn't sign up for a class. I laughed. She said that happens to me all the time especially when I order take-out. Many people are named Jen. What's your middle name? Louise. Use your middle name be Jen-Louise and be hyphenated  I suggested. That's a great idea, she said. Just then another lady showed up. Are you Jen? No. Then a lady I recognized showed up. Are you Jen? Yes! I remember you, I taught your son. 

Tonight we turned on the boiler for the first time this season. I immediately felt overheated so I ran downstairs to get a tank top and smelled something funny. I checked the boiler room - the basement was flooding. I yelled up to Bill. I dropped a bunch of towels on the puddles and hung a bucket to catch the water draining from the pump pipe. Bill shut off the boiler and found the off switch for the water pump. Bill investigated further. A shut off had not been turned back on by the boiler man. We turned it back on and the leak stopped and the water level came back to normal and we are relieved. I picked up the dirty wet towels and they are currently swishing away in the washing machine.

The week is not over yet but so far it's been a wild ride.

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