After having shamefully neglected our laundry for several weeks, Terry and I decided to take it to his grandparents' house to wash it. We figured this would give us free laundry services, clean clothes, and several hours to watch 24 while we waited. Sounds great right? But nothing could have prepared us for what was about to come.
We loaded all of our white clothing into the washer, sprinkled on a liberal amount of detergent, closed the lid and hit the button. But something didn't sound quite right. All we heard was a tiny little drip . . . drip . . . drip. We opened it back up to investigate. Our clothes were now wet enough that we didn't want to move them, but not wet enough to wash them. None of the sinks would turn on either. After numerous phone calls to Terry's parents, we discovered that a neighbor had seen the sprinklers on in the lawn that morning and had called the fire department to turn off the water. AH!
What other option did we have? We solemnly clasped hands, looked each other in the eye, and swore that we would turn the water back on or die trying. Ok not really. But we did want the water back on. We were under the impression that we had to turn some faucet thing that was located outside somewhere. So we grabbed a few flashlights and started following the freshest tracks in the snow, hoping they would lead us to something. And they did! They led us to all sorts of things - the air conditioner, the internet hookup, and all kinds of electrical boxes. But no water.
At this point, we decided to make a quick trip to Macey's to pick up a prescription before they closed. On our way into the parking lot, I spotted a big red fire truck in the adjacent lot. "Terry! The firemen are at Macey's!" I yelled. "They were the ones who turned off the water! We should find them and ask how to turn it back on!" I was so proud of my idea - what better way to contact the firemen than to run into them at the grocery store? Terry just laughed until he saw the firemen walking out of the store back to their truck. Then he rolled down the window and called the firemen over. He explained our predicament and asked if they knew how to turn on the water. They told us that there was a circular plate somewhere in the yard that said "WATER" on it. All we had to do was lift that up, and turn something under it. When we asked if we needed any special tools the guy said "Nope. Just a wrench. Oh and long arms." Um, long arms????
Upon returning to the house, we were quickly able to locate this elusive source-of-all-water. So, grabbing a wrench and the flashlights, we headed out to turn this thing. How long could this take, right? I mean really. All we had to do was turn something. Again, how very wrong we were.
When we got the plate off the ground, we discovered why the fireman had said we would need long arms. Under the plate was a large hole in the ground - probably about the length of an arm. In the middle of it were several pipes. And all around the pipes was dark, dirty, icy water. Sigh. Terry, being the wonderful, brave, and handsome guy that he is, rolled up his shirt sleeve and plunged his arm, holding the wrench, into the water. He tried for a few seconds to turn the little piece that looked like it could be turned, but pretty soon his whole arm was too cold and numb to continue.
Then our brains kicked in and we realized that we should first get the water out of the hole. Duh. So we grabbed a pot and bailed. It was so cold we could hear the water freezing moments after it hit the street. But it helped to have the water out and after another 10 minutes of pulling, prying, twisting, and pushing, Terry got the dang thing to turn.
At the happy sound of gurgling water beneath our feet, we both let out a victorious yell and breathed a sigh of relief. This victory was short-lived however, as we heard the tell-tale sound of a sprinkler, inches from where we were both standing.
Ya know, sometimes life just plays you a hard hand. Sometimes your favorite ice cream is out at the store, or you get to the dollar theater too late to get tickets to your movie, or your luggage on your honeymoon gets sent to New Jersey instead of Cancun. And sometimes you just can't turn off the dang sprinklers. Sometimes they stay on even if you unplug the system and turn it to off. Sometimes you have to leave them on for hours while you do (half of) your laundry. And sometimes the only way to get them to turn off is to turn off all the water again. This was one of those times.
We thought turning off the water would be even worse than turning it on because by now, the sprinklers were running and would fill up the hole in the ground with water faster than we could bail it out. And true, this meant Terry had to do the whole thing while lying flat on his stomach in the snow, with his arm in ice cold water. That part was worse I'm sure. But the universe threw us a bone and this time, it only took a few seconds to turn the faucet back to off.
And so, with freezing hands and clean clothes (or at least, half of them were clean), we returned home, swearing to never do laundry again. JK. But next time, we're going to MY grandparents' house.
