Stop and Smell the Chicken Soup

If there is a Murphy’s Law of appliance breakdowns, it is this: Appliances always break down on Fridays.

Our 3 month old Maytag front-loading washing machine, which has cut our water bill almost in half, blew a gasket Friday. Literally. Somehow the sheets that Fatso was washing got caught in the rubber gasket around the door, got all twisted, and pulled the gasket and some round wire thing away from the door.

Being a Friday, I could not get an appointment until Monday. Being that we are gone all day on Monday, I scheduled an appointment for Tuesday (today).

The good news: the washer is still under warrantee, so we do not have to pay anything. The bad news: it will take about 5 days to get the parts, so the repairman is coming NEXT Tuesday.

Tonight was our Homeschool co-op’s Thanksgiving Dinner. We were all looking forward to going. The high school history class was demonstrating different craftsman’s skills from Colonial times. Fatso’s was glassblowing, which obviously he could not really do, but he downloaded some videos to show on the laptop, and made a really nice display.

But he got sick this morning (upper respiratory stuff) and couldn’t go. Space Cadet wasn’t feeling well either.

I discovered there is a Laundromat close to where the dinner was being held, so Czarina, Hoodie Girl and I went there this afternoon to do about $16 worth of laundry. Our timing was pretty good for getting to the dinner on time. But while at the Laundromat, I noticed Czarina’s voice was getting hoarse, and Hoodie Girl’s nose was a bit sniffley. They insisted they were fine and wanted to go to the dinner. I’ve had a low-grade headache all day, and an occasional cough.

At the dinner, Hoodie Girl’s home-made ginger snaps were a big hit. Some of that is probably due to Czarina standing by the dessert table, telling everyone, “Try my sister’s ginger snacks! They are really good!” Well, that got people to try them. . . but then lots of the middle school boys went back for more. (If the way to a man’s heart is really through his stomach, Hoodie Girl is making quite an impression!)

After the dinner they went home with Prince Charming, who’d met us there, and I stopped by Wal-Mart for a “sick person run”. I got two chickens, ginger root, garlic cloves, different juices, Kleenex®, and some vitamin C.

Tonight I am making chicken broth in the crock pot. . . tomorrow I will turn it into chicken soup. Instead of complaining that we don’t have time to be sick, we will be taking it easy, eating chicken soup, drinking lots of fluids, and watching a movie or two. Hopefully we will bounce back and get to do all the neat Thanksgiving and Christmas decorating type things we hope to do next week!