it's not life that matters but the journey...

as if we hadn't had enough stress around here, this morning we had a drain pipe burst in the basement, flooding the entire bathroom, kitchen, storage and half of the living area of the basement apartment where I've been staying. I was sitting at the kitchen table drinking tea, when suddenly I heard the water backing up in the kitchen sink. The caretaker had just started a load of laundry down in the basement, and apparently the pipes from the kitchen to the downstairs plumbing are connected. The water coming up into the sink was dark grey and stunk like sewage! Then suddenly we heard the sound of rushing water in the basement and ran down there to find that water was gushing out of a pipe above the washing machine, and there was a couple inches of water already flooding the area around the washer, as well as the entire bathroom and even the kitchen area. That was because the water seeped underneath the floorboards and the floors are soaked through. And it seems it might be some sewage water mixed with the water from the washing machine and the kitchen - the guy who came to assess the damage and do the clean-up calls it black water - so the smell is absolutely horrible! My poor cat is freaking out because he's used to being downstairs for his litter box and food and bed, and we'll be likely sleeping up stairs tonight because we can't use the bathroom downstairs, and it's not healthy to inhale all that sewage which has become airborne. Also we can't use the kitchen sink until the plumber comes back tomorrow, so we'll have a pile of dishes waiting until tomorrow morning!

so tonight for dinner we're ordering some kind of takeout, and letting all the laundry and dishes pile up for awhile.

And my poor parents will have to foot the bill for all this - except good news is that the insurance company will probably pay for some of the repairs, like the replacement of the floorboards.

wonder what's going to happen next?