Oh the Shenanigans!

The last week and a half or so have been pure crazy. 

We've have busy weeks at work and so much else was happening that I'm pretty sure I wake up tired. Did I mention that I'm a reporter, and report on the military and city government here? Well, lately my brain has been swimming in information about nuclear weapons, sequestration and the city budget and zoning regulations. I love it, but some days, I just want to watch girly movies and think about paint colors. 

So, having an entire house that needs fixing up to come home to seems perfect, right?

Well, sometimes that doesn't quite work out.

First, there was this.

Having lived through a handful of tornadoes in Texas, South Dakota and Alabama, I was very concerned we were going to get hit with one. I was trying to bring in any loose items outside to prevent flying debris. Boyfriend said it was fine. See that cloud edge? The weather people told my co-worker at the paper the next day that was in fact a cyclical storm, but was too high to become a tornado. Yippee. 

Shortly after I took this photo, the winds got even stronger. Around 70 mph was recorded at the wildlife refuge down the road. You can even see specs of dirt and grass/leaves flying by. A town over had more damage and lost power until the following day I think.

Then it started to hail.

Golf ball sized hail. With high winds. 

The dogs were freaking out and I started getting stressed when I literally could see no further than a few feet out the window it was hailing so hard. 

Our cars were outside since the garage is still full of stuff and another car that's being repaired. 

Now our cars look like they have acne. 

The hail damage officially totaled my car, but things turned out pretty decent with the insurance settlement and I get to keep my car, so small victory. Boyfriend's car is being inspected this week. It's almost definitely totaled as well. 

Then, there was this.

We had what were the makings of a septic system disaster. Toilets weren't working right, the upstairs hall closet near the bathroom smelled funny and then the shower filled with gross water. I won't give you all the icky details but I was freaking out. Septic issues can be hugely expensive and, well, messy. 

So until we could get the septic people out to do an inspection, we made evening trips to Wal-Mart, like we were quasi camping, didn't run the water, and showered using water in a bucket. I'm all for camping, I am not for sticking my head in a bucket to wash my hair, in my own house. 

The septic guys gave us the glorious news that the major issue was that the previous owners had not had the system pumped like they said they had and there was a hole on top of the tank and the think had filled with rainwater. So, we spent about $200 getting things in working order and learning a lot about our particular system and how to prevent any future problems, versus the catastrophe I had been envisioning. I have a tendency to mentally work through the worst case scenario and then be pleasantly surprised when things turn out fine. Some days it might give me ulcers, but it has ultimately served me well.

From what I'm hearing, every homeowner has horror stories of things that went wrong and sometimes everything just happens at once. It was a stressful, hits just keep on coming kind of week, but then everything turned out just fine really.

On days when we just can't win, our solution to craziness looks like this. Obviously. I'm thinking you can guess what I picked.