I was so happy. And then...

I went to bed so happy last night.
Our house is slowly falling apart all around us, and I'm not even talking about all the damage the dogs have caused. No, I'm referring to the faucets that drip, the downspout that's come loose from the guttering, the windows that don't have a good seal... the stuff that just stops working very well after it gets a few years of use on it.
We've now been in our house 16 years and 11 days. It's time to start making some repairs, if only one at a time. Baby steps. Baby steps.
We've got three faucets that needed to be fixed/replaced. I'm not even going to discuss our bathtub faucet. However, the kitchen faucet has been dripping for a couple of years now. If you don't get that handle in "just the right position" and turn the faucet to the left side, then it will drip and drive you batty if you're within earshot. Long ago, I started leaving a bowl in the sink to catch the drips and too, while I'm waiting for the water to warm up, I let it run into the dish and then give this to the dogs. Better than letting it just go down the drain.
The bathroom faucet, it started dripping a couple of years ago also, but at least if you turn the knob so that it points between the 10 and 11 o'clock position then it won't. Anything past 12 and it drips like crazy, anything before 10, and it's a slow drip.
Enough was enough!! Monday evening, I told the husband come hell or high water, we were going to purchase new faucets. So after dinner, we went to Lowes and I perused the many choices on the wall. Needless to say, I was in stick-shock!! Who knew faucets could be so expensive?? Some were several hundred dollars. OMG!! Were these things going to reach out and rub my hands together for me or were they going to read my mind and know whether I was wanting hot, cold, or just warm water? Good grief!!
Needless to say, we chose at the low end. Not the cheapest, but close to it.
As soon as we got home, the husband grabbed boxes from the garage and started clearing all the junk out from underneath the bathroom sink. Wow! We've accumulated a lot of crap under there. I guess this would be a good time to sort through it and throw some stuff away. That's about all he got accomplished that first night. Didn't have time Tuesday. Wednesday, he laid down in the bathroom floor and examined the pipes under the sink and (and this impressed me to no end!!) he actually looked at the directions. What man ever does this???
He decided this might actually take him several hours to accomplish and as it was already after 7pm, I told him to wait to Sunday afternoon or 'til his next day off. He agreed. Last night however, he came home and started to tackle it again.
He got the old faucet removed, and then ran into his first stumbling block. The old faucet had copper pipes that were about 2' long. The new faucet had copper pipes that were about 6" long. Don't think the new one will quite stretch. He took both back to Lowe's and asked advice (and I didn't even have to go with him!!) He came back after having spent another $10 purchasing a pair of hoses that would fill in the gap.
Within half an hour, he had the new faucet installed and it works beautifully. It's a Moen... "buy it for looks, buy it for life". Indeed! I love my new faucet. No drips. No need to position the handle "just so". And it's so nice and shiny. I went through several pieces of papertowel this morning, wiping it off every time I saw a drop of water splashed on it, in my efforts to keep it clean and shiny. Trust me, that novelty will wear off real quick. Now he can tackle the kitchen sink with a little more confidence tonight.
So as I said at the beginning, I went to bed last night, so happy. But, gee, what a difference 9 hours can make.
I had gone to bed before John. He didn't have to be at work 'til 8am this morning (totally unheard of for him!!!), so he slept in 'til 6am. The dogs had actually woke me up a little before then, but as it only sounded like play coming from the other room, I made no effort to get up and take them out, feeling they could wait just a few minutes.
**sigh**
Once I finally crawled from the bed and straightened my achy back out enough so that I could walk upright, I went to the living room and flicked on the light. My blood pressure immediately sky rocketed at the mess I saw. But did the dogs get blamed for the mess? No. They are dogs. John is the one that got yelled and screamed at for forgetting to place the yoga ball in my recliner, thus leaving the chair as fair game for one of the dogs to try and get in. Olivia can get in my chair usually without any problems. Only on a couple of rare occasions in the past has she tipped it over backwards, so I'm having my doubts that it was her. Bootsy on the other hand...
Ever since we moved the furniture about 3 years ago and got the dogs their own futon to sleep on, she stopped getting onto our furniture. Then, all of a sudden, completely out of the blue about 2 weeks ago, she started getting up on the chair that Olivia usually sleeps on. We keep a milk crate under the ottoman of this chair so it won't tip forward and as there is a table right behind it, it can't tip over backwards. But if Bootsy tried to climb in my chair, she'd been rocking back and forth wildly and easily have tipped it over. As if the tipped over chair wasn't bad enough, whichever dog did it, also knocked over the table lamp, breaking the lamp shade and shattering the bulb (not a cheap bulb either).
And as if all this wasn't bad enough, one of the dogs had thrown up in the hallway (at least they had the courtesy to go on the vinyl so it was easier for me to clean up).
And, to make matters even worse still, the skin tag that Bootsy has on her right elbow was bleeding profusely and there were large blood stains all over the house. The carpet, the recliner, the dogs bedding, the kitchen floor. It looked like a war zone in my house (more so than usual).
I went from complete giddiness over my new faucet and a mere nine hours later I felt I was living in the depths of hell. Perhaps if he can get that other faucet installed tonight, my good mood will return.