It's been a busy month...

Gawd, I never want to move again...

I know, in a few years, I'll forget the pain. But just now, my left ankle, both knees, right wrist and neck are all singing in unison:
"Are You NUTS??!!" is the tune, one I don't particularly care for...

I discovered yesterday that I've been cleaning windows incorrectly all my life. My girlfriend K came over to help me, and was shocked at the system I'd set up. She shook her head violently, said "No... No. Come with me." And proceeded to teach me how to wash windows.

See, you don't scrape the dead fauna from the slots in aluminum windows with a screwdriver, onto the floor.

Now remember, my mother never got a chance to bring me up - so don't blame her. And as a kid, if my grandparents cleaned the windows, I was at school.

What you apparently do is take the windows to the bathroom, put a towel inside the tub so you don't scrape the tub, and use HOT water and a BRUSH to evict the inhabitants and their nests from the crevices of the windows! And you then use a scouring pad to get the dinginess off the frames, and finally clean the window and screens, and you rinse like crazy. Then you dry.

And it takes about six hours to do the job, so get a good night's sleep the night before and eat your Wheaties.

Well, the next thing I learned is just how much gunk can accumulate at the bottom of your everyday hot water heater. People - LISTEN UP: You're supposed to DRAIN these things at least once a year! That way, the silt on the bottom doesn't build up. To a depth of FOUR INCHES, which is what Hubby scraped out of the bottom of mine yesterday! He used a hollow piece of pipe to scrape as much as he could, dumping it into a garbage bag, which he gave to the landlord - along with with the admonition that perhaps Mr. M. should look at HIS heater soon!

Yeesh.

Yesterday was not the most pleasant day, weather-wise, in the world. It rained, it was cold. Because all the windows were out, we had a visit from a neighbourhood cat, a big orange tabby with a surprisingly tiny head compared to his girth, and an exceedingly pleasant personality. He played with a twist-tie all afternoon. In between being chased by Bijou, my own Tortoise Shell baby cat. Bijou did eventually get on with her nap, which left Mr. Orange free to play with his twist tie in peace. (When it stopped raining though, I did give him an encouraging shove back out the window.)

But by far the best event that happened yesterday was the installation of the washing machine.

See, when I woke up yesterday, I surveyed my laundry basked with great sorrow. My jeans were in it. I couldn't wear my jeans to do all this work in. (It's PRETTY BAD if your jeans are too dirty to wash windows in.)

If I'd been able to wear my jeans, I could have looked reasonably normal while doing all this work. But all I had to wear was a pair of black yoga pants I'd made myself about ten years ago, and a black stretchy top. With my ... "ample" ... figure, I looked like a particularly lumpy potato sack. To add to my misery, Mr. M had to drain the hot water tank first thing in the morning in order to get ready for Hubby to replace the burnt-out bottom element. Now, that hadn't sounded so bad the day before when he told me, fresh from my shower. But as the day wore on and I heaved and carried and scrubbed and dried, in my progressively damper and damper stretch clothes, I began to not like myself very much. In actual fact, I wanted to crawl into the laundry basket with my jeans and cry.

Because there's ALWAYS a setback - don't you know? It's in the rules!

The first setback was the bolts on the hot water tank were stripped, and a trip to the hardware store was required. The second setback was the staggering amount of gunk at the bottom of the tank. So the day had been far too long for all of us.

Since all my laundry stuff was still at the old apartment, Beautiful Daughter came over with laundry soap, spray'n'wash, and lavender & sandalwood scented fabric softener for me. I wept and kissed her feet. Then the magic happened - my first load of laundry. Daughter had also brought a dollar-store clothesline for me, and we experimented with it till we found a pretty good arrangement. In no time my apartment was hung with towels, socks, underwear, and, (thankfully) my jeans.

I closed the windows, turned the heat on, dragged the dehumidifier out of the closet, and did a second, and a third load.

Since I have no furniture to absorb sound waves, the dehumidifier makes a terrific roar. I was obliged to turn it off so I could sleep last night, but it's back in business this morning. I estimate that by 7 pm tonight the jeans should be wearable.

Right now, my apartment is just like a scene from "The Honeymooners", minus curlers for my hair and Ralph threatening to send me to the moon. This was not my vision of what my life would be like at 51, when I was 20! This was not what I thought my life would be like in February, when I first left my ancestral home to strike out on my own once again.

"On my own."! THAT'S a laugh! Hubby hasn't had to work so hard to help me in years! The washing machine that was installed yesterday, and the dryer that is coming in two weeks, are both on loan from a Girlfriend. Other Girlfriends are donating their time, energy, money, and expertise to buy me stuff I need, help me get organized and clean, feed me from time to time, stopping me from sobbing into my cups each night. Even strangers and new neighbours are being kind to me - one lady mentioning she saw my cat under a certain set of stairs, one man bringing said cat to my door, another chatting me up. I'm beginning to wonder just HOW bad I look from an outsider's point of view!

All of this kindness has caused me to wonder, are any of us ever really "on our own?" Because, if I had REALLY been so, I'm not sure how bad it would have looked. Thank you everyone for calling, lifting, scrubbing, fixing, shopping, cooking, lending... even just smiling at me. It makes a difference. A big one.