Recently, my husband took a work trip to Budapest, Hungary-a new country for his travel portfolio! He was responsible for implementing a new branch for his company and hiring all new staff, talk about a steep learning curve! He thoroughly enjoyed his time and did lots of site seeing-from the Castle District, St. Stephen’s Bascilica Cathedral to the Eye of Budapest. His other favorite thing….. Hungarian goulash! A hearty dish with lots of vegetables, it kept him warm during the cold season in Hungary.
Meanwhile, back at home we were in the midst of house repair chaos. Unfortunately for me, I decided it would be a good idea to run the dishwasher and leave straight for work so that I would have one less thing to do when we got home from work and school. Just the usual stuff….dinner, homework, school reading for 20 minutes, piano, etc, etc, etc. Boy was I wrong! Instead I came home to a flooded kitchen because (drum roll please)….the GARBAGE DISPOSAL went out! Really?? Come on!!! It’s amazing how 2 completely different appliances are so intricately connected. In the words of our son….Fun Fact: Did you know that the dishwasher drains INTO the garbage disposal and if it stops working ALLLL the water drains out of the bottom of the disposal?? Now I know.
Furthermore, we had scheduled drywall repair for our kitchen ceiling which ended up taking 3 days to complete! When it came time to paint, I found out the paint manufacturer no longer sold our particular color and didn’t keep the formula to reproduce it. Really?? This meant I spent 2 days trying to match paint samples from Lowes and Home Depot to paint that has been in our kitchen for 10 years. Did I find an exact match? No. Did I find a close match? Yes. Is it obvious they don’t match? Yes!! Luckily, nobody walks into your house looking up at your ceiling, at least I hope they don’t. …So much for having less work in the evening. By the end of the week, I had learned more about appliances and paint colors than I care to admit but we survived.
And without further a due, here are your surviving chaos tips:
- Run your dishwasher in the evening or at night
- Crock-pot meals are your friend (The day the kitchen flooded, I made a Crock-pot meal. It saved dinner and part of my evening)
- Have an emergency (garbage disposal replacement isn’t expensive and isn’t cheap)
- Have a sense of humor (laugh to keep from crying)
- Red Wine (trust me on this won-you’ll need it!)
The Traveller's Wife 