House on strike

After writing the novel for NaNoWriMo in November, I figured my December would be focused on holiday preparation. You know, hanging lights and decorating, washing sheets and towels for the guest rooms, baking, buying and wrapping gifts. Instead, I’m behind on all of that because my house has decided to  go on strike.  In the last two weeks, all manner of odd things have gone awry:

Our phone line had a horrible buzzing on it for a few days until the phone company was able to fix the problem.

The high winds blew the grill down the deck steps and blew the porch furniture all over the yard.

The new gas fireplace we installed to help heat our drafty living room is leaking gas so we can’t use it. (FYI, wind chill today is 5 degrees. My living room is a not-so-balmy 62 degrees.)

I woke one morning to find the kitchen sliding door covered in ice crystals. “Ooh, pretty,” I said to the dogs. Then I realized the crystals were on the inside, which didn’t make sense. The glass had crackled into a zillion pieces and the entire pane was bowing out, about to collapse into a zillion pieces on my kitchen floor. The glass replacement guy has no idea what would make this happen. We’re living with a single pane in that window while the new double-pane window is on order.

Our well water has turned black and smells disgusting. The water system guy says it’s sulfites solidifying in our hot water tank, but I think we might be having our own little Amityville Horror. Every filter he tries  offers only a slight improvement and then only for a few days.

But bad water is better than no water at all. The pump on the well keeps blowing the circuit breaker. Either the pump is broken or there is simply no water in the ground to pump. Either way, the water level in our holding tank is growing dangerously low. And I have family coming on Friday.