I knew what kind of day it would be when I opened my laundry room door one morning and found my cat doing the backstroke in two inches of water which covered the entire floor. Sloshing past sodden undies (escapees from the clean clothes basket) and plucking an angry kitty off my ankle (it’s true cats hate water) I found the source of the problem–the washing machine.

The day before, a plumber came to the house and poked into the mystery of why waste water was pooling on the ground directly above our sewer line. The man–obviously happy he could impress this little lady with his knowledge–puffed out his chest and barraged me with a string of technical terms. I smiled and nodded my head like a puppet on string, not caring what do-hickey do this or that. The only thing that mattered to me was that poop went down the drain when the toilet flushed. I’d been attacked by a flying turd many years ago in a toilet plunging incident, and I didn’t care for a repeat.

From what I gathered from the plumber, he was going to reroute the drain of my washing machine to the back yard. He reasoned that this would not only solve the pooling of grey water above ground, it’d also be a way to water the grass in the summer. Hey, recycling? I was all for that.

That night (several hours after the plumber had completed the job) I put a load of clothes in the washer, never thinking to check the man’s work before turning on the machine.

And now I had a sea in my laundry room. Turned out the darn hose had fallen out of the drain. An hour, several mop buckets and wet towels later, I had the room semi-dry. I felt like the undead as I stumbled back into the kitchen and reached for the phone. There’d been no time for coffee that morning; everything had to be cleaned up before the boys awoke.

The disappointment over the fact I hadn’t installed an indoor pool on the laundry room would’ve been great. There’d be no parties, lounging on piles of orphaned socks while friends floated by on rafts made of detergent bottles; my boys would try to have my June Cleaver club membership revoked.

Squinting, I dialed the plumber’s number. I felt my blood pressure rise as he–rather gleefully–told me that since I was calling before hours, he’d have to charge extra.

‘That’s robbery,” I hissed.

“That’s business.”

“Be grateful I don’t give you the business,” I said as I hung up.

As if the day wasn’t crappy enough, I made a batch of biscuits, turned on my three year old, self-cleaning, smooth-toped stove and…nothing . The preheat alert for the oven never came on. I stuck my hand inside and the racks were cool to the touch. The bottom element was broken. Wonderful. I had to cook the biscuits in my roaster oven, which took almost twice as long.

You’d think a flooded laundry room, a plumber on his way over to bilk me, and a non-working stove would be the end of my bad luck, right? Nope. The boys, smelling the biscuits, awakened and started for the kitchen, hungry wolves in children’s bodies. Unfortunate for Robert, he tripped over a toy car and fell face-first into the dresser.

I never noticed, as I consoled him and cleaned his bloody lip, that he’d grabbed my white shirt, leaving a bloody hand print near the bottom.

A few minutes later, the plumber arrived, his eyes widening at the sight of me. Not saying a word, he hasten to the laundry room, corrected his error and even mopped up a few stray patches of water. He left as quickly as he arrived, saying there wasn’t any charge for the trip.

It wasn’t until a little later when I glanced in the mirror and saw the stain. Funny how a little thing like a stain can change a person’s attitude, don’t you think? :o)