Tuesday, March 07, 2006

As long as I'm ranting

Ah, easy come, easy go. We had such plans for our income tax return. We got a really nice one back and whammo! the furnace went out. Of course. $2500 later, we kissed most of our return goodbye, but at least we have heat. Oh, the tradeoffs we must make. I'm happy we had the money to do it when it was needed, but still...

A few nights later, Katy stepped out of her shower and yelled "MOOOOOOM! What happened to the hot water!?" Oh, geez. We have a tankless water heater, so there was only one reason it could be. In all the hassling with the furnace, we both forgot to check the propane tank. Yep, bone dry. This is the first (and LAST!) time we ever let that happen. But why did it have to happen at night when it was too late to call the gas company out and WHY did it have to happen on a really cold night? John spent 40 minutes trying to start a fire in the wood burning furnace, but without kerosene and the yukky, tough wood we have, it just didn't happen. He gave up and was going to head out for kerosene, but when I went downstairs to get the container, there were flames licking out of the furnace. Now I'm no expert on fire making, but I was pretty darn sure those flames shooting out mixed with the smoke emanating from my furnace were a clear indication of fire. How annoying, but at least it finally took off and we had heat. However, I knew the morning to come was not going to be fun because I had an ice cold shower to look forward to. I tossed and turned worrying about it all night and it actually turned out to be worse than I thought it would be. You have to understand, I cannot leave my house without a shower. I just can't do it, but not getting a shower just isn't enough of a reason for me to miss work in my mind...so ice cold water it was. My fingers actually went numb and I didn't feel warm until about five hours after I stepped out of the shower, not to mention my red fingers. Let that be a bitter reminder to me not to let that tank run dry again.

Fast forward to Saturday. I had decided to apply for a new state job title, one with better pay that will hopefully whisk me away from my current hellhole of a boring job. I had to take a merit test for it and it happened to land on this particular Saturday. I was sailing along fine through it until I came to an entire section on Statistics. I hate Statistics. I loathe Statistics. I think Statistics is an asinine, purely invented nonsensical FAKE math that some idiot invented to confuse otherwise sane and reasonably intelligent people. It is totally without merit and meaningless. Needless to say, I wasn't thrilled. Unfortunately, the 15 minute limit of ditching the test to take it later had passed so I was stuck taking it. I won't find out for a couple of weeks if I passed and am on the register. I'm keeping my fingers crossed because I really want a different job. Mine has become so dull I have read five 300+ page novels in the past two weeks.

And in other news...I want to scrap! There just aren't enough hours in the day lately. Maybe this weekend....

3 comments:

Bonni said...

Sorry you had to get a new furnace but at least you had the tax money to fall back on....let us know how the test goes

Carolyn F said...

My car & house always know when I have a little extra cash -- I spent on plumbing and car this tax season. Good luck on the test!

Jill said...

Ouch on the furnace, the no heat thing and the hot water. Frustrating huh? BUt If I remember right, you passed the test! LOL! See some good was in there.