April gets better

I probably should have posted right after last week's sad story, to let people know that our plumbing problem was solved quickly. But I'm trying to stick to this Sunday schedule, except for occasional reading posts, so here we are a week later and I've almost forgotten what misery we were in a week ago.

That's the thing I've noticed about a lot of horrible stuff: fixing it just removes the misery, it resets you to normal; it doesn't really make you happy, except briefly. But removing misery is still a good thing, and I'm NOT complaining.

So what happened was this: last Monday the plumbers called Rocket Boy and told him they had a cancellation and would he like them to put the sewer tap in that day instead of Tuesday. RB said yes! do it! and so around 10 am or so a plumbing truck was parked in our driveway. After a fair bit of backing and forthing, they settled down to dig a hole in our front yard, but close to the house, behind the pfitzers, so it didn't show very much. The hole was right beneath my bedroom window, so I couldn't sit on my bed and read while they worked -- I mean, I guess I could have, but it would have been weird. So I sat in the office with the kids (who had the day off from school) and played computer solitaire. The weather was nasty: first it rained, and then gradually it turned to snow. (By the next morning, Boulder had received 9 or 10 inches.) Oh, and we skipped the museum trip we'd planned, obviously. The money I spent on IMAX tickets ended up being a donation. It's fine.

Mid-afternoon the plumbers came to the door and told me they were ready to start working on the clog, so would I please flush the toilet a few times and turn on some faucets so they'd have a steady stream of water flowing. Figuring that we had used very little water the previous five days, I turned on the faucets for the kitchen and bathroom sinks, and proceeded to wash the pile of recycling (by hand, but dumping the water down the drain when it got dirty). Maybe half an hour later they knocked on the door again: "We're done! That was a pretty nasty clog, but you should be good now." I wrote them a check for $2750 and they left, with these two white plugs the only evidence of their work. 

And we went back to normal life. I put the rest of the dishes in the dishwasher and ran it, everybody used the toilet repeatedly, and Kid A took a shower. The next day I took a shower, and Wednesday I finally decided it was safe to put the dirty towels in the washing machine. I have to admit that every time I turn on the water I still flinch slightly, afraid it won't go down the drain. But it's been almost a week with no problems -- I think we're good.

Otherwise it was a quiet week. My book group met Tuesday (still via Zoom) and I told them about our plumbing woes, but by then it had already become an amusing anecdote. We spent more time talking about the book, Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu, which no one liked. It's about what it's like to grow up and live ethnically Asian, specifically Chinese, in the USA, and none of us warmed up to the author's experimental style. Still, it did make an impression on me. I remembered an Asian guy I dated in grad school and how conscious he was of being Asian in a white world. Being from California, I tend to think of the US as not really a white world, because California is only 36.8% non-Hispanic white, and 15.3% of the population is Asian -- the highest percentage of any state except Hawaii. But most states are not like that. Michigan, where I went to school, is only 2.4% Asian, and Colorado, where of course I live now, is only 2.8% Asian.

The more we talked, the more truth came out. One member recalled that where she grew up, in San Diego (but a long time ago), the only ethnically Asian person in her life was a man who worked at Burger King. She and her siblings called him "Mr. Ah-so." They thought it was funny. I remembered that there were two Asian kids in my class in elementary school, one ethnically Chinese and one ethnically Japanese. Constantly, white kids would come up to them and ask, "Are you Chinese or Japanese?" Once I learned which was which, I would get cross at people who asked the question, because one last name (Wong) was so obviously Chinese, and the other (Maruhashi) was so obviously Japanese. In truth, the girls weren't Chinese or Japanese, they were American, probably for multiple generations, but having Asian features brands you forever as Asian, foreign. I have been asked whether I'm Swedish (that blond hair, you know), and I've been told I look German. But it's different. 

I'm not Swedish, as far as I know. I'm German, Scottish, Welsh, English, Dutch, and.... My father's father's family came from Schleswig-Holstein, close to the Danish border, so it's possible that some of my ancestors are from farther north.

Next month we're going to read The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters by Balli Kaur Jaswal, which is about three sisters going back to India to scatter their mother's ashes. It's supposed to be light-hearted and cosy, which we all wanted, but if it is, it will probably end up annoying me. I need to go buy the book, need to put that on some list.

What else happened last week? On Wednesday I was interviewed by a professor at CU who's doing a study on how undergraduates are rude and aggressive toward untenured faculty members. I had agreed to participate a week before, just as our plumbing problems were taking hold, and remembering some of my badly behaved students had made me feel worse. The interview was interesting, though. I'll have to look for papers she writes about the results.

Finally, on Friday morning, I got my second dose of the Covid vaccine (Pfizer), and I have spent the weekend recovering from it. I didn't have a bad reaction -- I've just felt tired. Friday night I was exhausted, couldn't get to bed fast enough, and I slept maybe 10 hours. I lazed around all day Saturday (at one point the cats and I had a good nap on my bed) and slept another 10 hours last night. But I think I'm feeling better today. My arm is no longer sore and I never had a fever or other body aches, like Rocket Boy did. It's a very good feeling to know that in 12 days I will be considered as "safe" as it's possible to be right now.

Our 9-10 inches of snow has all melted, and everything looks wet and green outside. Nothing is blooming yet except a few dandelions, but the early bees will appreciate those. Oh, I guess there were a couple of grape hyacinth near the clothesline. The allium leaves look rather battered, but I hope the plants will still bloom. I feel like going out and buying a bunch of annuals to plant, but I'll hold off for now. All we have in the forecast for the next week is rain -- and sun, of course -- no snow. But this is Colorado, so the snow could come again in May. At least for April, though, I think we're done.

I guess I could do a to-do list for the week ahead, but I don't really want to. So far I have nothing scheduled except a Zoom call next Saturday, so there's lots of time available. Maybe I should review what I had planned to get done during the month of April.

Monthly goals (April):

• Make contact with a friend and/or family member. I wrote to my old friend in Los Angeles. Could think about this one this week.
  
• Book group. Did everything I needed to do for this month. I could buy the book for May.
  
• Classics Challenge 2021. I read the first book on my list, posted about it, and am almost done with the second. I'll try to post about that one this coming week.
  
• Take the twins somewhere fun. No, and it won't happen this week either. Aim for May.
  
• Donate $$ to some organization. Ah, yes, need to choose. I had thought about doing something related to the environment. I'll do that this week.
  
• Do one of the smaller goals on my master list. April, as I assumed, was another health month, as well as a plumbing month. I'll think of something else for May.

Actually, one thing I definitely want to do this week is get back into exercising. That really needs my attention. If I take a walk every day in this nice weather I'll be doing well. So I'll focus on that. Starting today.