I want to write this down before I more time passes. I’m sick (you know I’m really sick when I begrudgingly follow Jeremy’s stern suggestion without much protesting that I take Motrin instead of suffering and moaning because I know he is right and I need to feel good to fix a leaky toilet tout suite!) and Jeremy is stressed about work and we have 40 people coming for Thanksgiving and we are behind. Because we are not our best selves right now, every decision is fraught with an edge of argument. Should we go to dinner early or after our other obligation? Should we order the green one or the yellow one? How should we accommodate our overnight guests? What exactly is sexual harassment?
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Friday, I went downtown to see Tony, Tash & Sara. I had a minute to duck into West Elm, a catalog I have long received, but I have never stepped into a store. I can honestly say – I want nothing in this store – it is all beautiful, but I desire none of it.
We met at Ted’s Bulletin on 14th street.
Baby Sara is a cutie-pie!
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Friday night, my parents and our neighbor Sophie went to see Vince’s The Little Mermaid. It was beautifully done, the costumes were amazing – Vince told me they rented them from someplace. Vince gave Sophie a tour of the control booth during intermission. The next night was closing night and Vince went to the afterparty. He called me in my Mortin stupor at 9 pm Sat night as I was settling into bed – hey mom, we are going to the afterparty and staying until midnight. Can you pick us up then…..? Or we could take a Lyft….? Yes love, I answer, please take a Lyft . Then Vince says – feel better soon mom! Then I realize that this is the first party he’s going to that is large and at some random person’s house (where? I dunno, he answers, wait! North Potomac somewhere) and I yell into the phone to try and catch him before he hangs up – make good choices! use good judgement! I didn’t get to yell – consent! consent! which I would have if I had had more of my wits about me. (Ack. Then I go to sleep.)
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I spent all of yesterday slightly sick and getting sicker while fixing the toilet in the basement. Bryan mentioned on Thursday that the toilet was leaking and he was game to help replace the wax ring – so we made a date on Saturday morning. As soon as we lifted the toilet off, I knew it was going to be longer than the standard wax ring replacement hour-long repair. The toilet flange was installed too high, about 1/2 inch higher than it should be and, as a result, the wax ring got smooshed too much resulting in the leaking and I knew it would leak soon again if I just replaced the ring and put it back into place. They (the previous toilet installer (presumably the builder)) tried to shim the toilet into place, but 1/2 inch is a lot of shimming.
We basically had to raise the floor a half inch to meet the bottom of the toilet. This involved a total of three trips to home depot, 2 wax rings (I always need 2 because I always screw up the first one) & a purchase of a jig saw.
We made a template for the base for a new toilet-shaped subfloor. This was when I started sleeping on the couch kind of moaning and getting really sick. This was when Jeremy told me gently, but with no nonsense tone, to take a Motrin and keep on keeping on fixing the toilet, for though these photos show Jeremy at home depot and cutting out the template, toilet fixing is in my wheelhouse and not his and we could not leave the downstairs tenants without a working toilet for longer than absolutely necessary. I started the toilet project at 9 am and I finished less than 12 hours later at almost 9 pm.
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In the mid-day, we went to celebrate Nat & Dara’s new house! I’m so happy for them :).
