My Life as an Amish Woman

2004-03-25 at 8:12 a.m.


Yesterday was downright Amish.

I got up first thing in the morning to check my email, only to discover I couldn't access the internet. I figured it was my computer, because it's always my computer, but even after re-booting, my attempts to get online were unsuccessful. I tried to use my back up internet source, NetZero. It took thirty minutes of loading to finally arrive at the NetZero start page. When I tried to bring up hotmail and yahoo, all I got was a frozen computer.

I called K at work to ask if he was having trouble accessing the internet and he said he was - that it was just parked.

Great.

I went on about my day, hoping things would resolve themselves later. I took some chicken out of the freezer to thaw for dinner. Since I had chicken juice all over my hands, I immediately went to wash them. I turned on the water to hear...

"GRzZZZZZguggglegreZzZzZ.... "

Let me guess. We got a notice from the builder last week that the water would have to be shut off throughout the neighborhood one day this week to repair a broken water main. They assured us we would get advance notice of this time period so we might plan accordingly. I guess my "notice" was the aforementioned sound emerging from my faucet.

I never realized how much one depends on water and takes for granted its availability. I wiped my hands thoroughly with some disinfectant wipes and scoured them with antibacterial gel - something I normally HATE to use, because of its effect on my skin.

I hadn't showered yet. Luckily the water wasn't turned off while I was standing in the shower with soap running from my hair into my eyes.

No mat-ter how many times I explained to the kids that the water was off, they kept coming in and announcing...

"The toilet is broken!"

"The faucet makes a water sound, but has no water!"

"This toilet is broked too!"

Without the internet and with salmonella-infected hands, I was at a loss what to do with my day. Oh well, I might as well do some laundr... Oops. Can't do that. Well, I'll finish assembling dinner in the crock pot. This went well, until reaching the instruction:

"Add one cup water"

Shit. In a rare flash of brilliance, it occured to me to defrost the ice cubes from the ice cube trays. Not bad, eh? I had enough for my recipe and some left over for rinsing my sink.

I loaded the kids up in the car and drove to the bank, where I made a deposit, then took the kids to lunch. I was so good on my diet - I didn't surrender to the smell of wonderful, greasy McDonald's french fries, one of my weaknesses. In fact, it never even occured to me. I so pwoud.

In my travels, I noticed that one gas station still had gas for $1.58, while all the others in the area had skyrocketed up to a ridiculous $1.78. I decided I'd better top off while I could still somewhat afford to. Me and everyone else in town.

At home, my water was still off and my internet still inaccessible. I vaguely remember studying this period in school. I think soon we invent the wheel.

The water came back on at 4:45pm. I washed my hands for ten minutes. Didn't they know they had a woman with a disorder living here? I flushed every toilet and rinsed my sinks. Then I happily started a load of laundry.

As of this morning, I still can't get AOL to load. I'm online now through a back up carrier. I never thought I would miss AOL. Oh my God, did I say that?

Even if I had been able to get online yesterday, I hadn't planned on giving any AI commentary. Frankly, I have nothing new to say. The same people who have always sucked, sucked even worse Tuesday.

The two people who are phenominal proved that, as well. Nothing new. The only thing worth noting is that Diana, who normally is one of the better perfomers, absolutely deserved to be in the bottom three last night. She didn't deserve to go home, but face it... she was horrible Tuesday.

I sometimes wonder if these judges are even in the same time zone. They kudoed her to death when, from where I sat, she didn't get a single note in tune. I was surprised as hell that Jennifer wasn't the one to go home or even make the bottom three.

Ma-tt deserved to go home, without a doubt. I, for one, am glad. His overbearing, obnoxious personality would have been the death of me had it continued another week, not to mention the nauseating singing.

Jon Peter's popularity still continues to amaze me. The judges all admitted, politely, that he was horrendous, but he continues to rack in the votes. I can't for the life of me see what people see in him, but since many of you like him, I'll try to keep the commentary to a minimum.

I doubt anyone would have even noticed that John S. forgot the lyrics to "King of the Road" had Randy not pointed it out. What a good job he did of covering it. And actually, Roger Miller did have a "Bo De Bop Bumm bumm dumm" verse towards the end, so it sounded completely natural to me. I think John will finish second in this competition, to La Toya.

Well, I better get. I've got three sick kids so my day will be a hectic one.

I love you guys...

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