Birds and Bubbles...

Yesterday was...well, for the most part, it was good.  I took a few photos, did some writing, learned a very cool new thing, started a great book.  Then had to deal with an unexpected event.  I suppose if I were desperate, the event might be the something new for this week's adventure of the 52s.  It isn't.  Because the 52s are meant to be fun.

Anyway.

First thing in the morning, I open the blinds that look over the backyard, and there was this most beautiful Mourning Dove sitting on the fence.  I grabbed my camera and when she turned her head toward me for just a moment, I took this shot through the bathroom window...

Nice way to start the day.

After walking the dogs, I decided to do the laundry when we got home.  Once that was started, and I came back upstairs, I happened to glance outside and saw my resident hawk circling overhead.  Again, snagged the camera, then went outside on the back deck and tried to follow his motions so I could get a photo.  Pretty impossible really; he was up high, and I had to use the telephoto, which made things blurry.  Still.  Look at the wing span.  He truly is about the biggest hawk I've ever seen...

Notice anything odd about these two shots?  Try the blue sky.  What happened to the snow?  Good question.  The temperature was in the low 20s, but the clouds just vanished like smoke by late morning.  So much for being socked in by a blizzard.

Then, because this is how life often goes, later in the day I got an email from my mother.  With pictures of more birds, this time peacocks.  Apparently it was Avian Day.  Now, before we get to the two photos I'm going to share, I have a confession to make, and I don't even care that I'm admitting my ignorance--which is not bliss to me.  I would rather learn something than remain clueless.

Confession:  I have been lots of places, seen many peacocks.  But never once, ever, have I seen one fly, or even imagined that they could.  They're so laden with all those brilliant feathers, I thought they were like an ostrich or emu: flightless birds.

OMG, look at this...

How amazingly beautiful!  I don't know where Mom got these photos, they were just attached to an email and there was nothing to identify the photographer or the locations.  My shock--after the incredible display of color and Phoenix-like elegance--was that peacocks can actually fly!  That is truly something I would love to see.

So, my day was taken up with birds and photographs and the contemplation of learning a wondrous new thing.  Then I remembered the blasted laundry and dashed downstairs to switch the wash into the dryer.

You know that scene in movies or on television where the distraught woman is wading through a room full of soap bubbles as she tries to find her washing machine?  Uh huh.

I actually got halfway across the floor before my brain registered the frothy bubbles, and my new pond, forming under the washer, the dryer and the sink.  WTF?  I will spare you, dear people, of the many, many ways I used the f-word, in 40 different languages, even tossing in a few I made up--though I'm betting they would be very useful to ogres and trolls.

An hour later, all the mess mopped up, twenty towels and rags in a sodden heap outside the garage, I now had to determine what the hell happened.  I do not want to call a repair guy, and Sears (where I bought the set barely two years ago) closed down last Summer, so that avenue for help is a dead end.  And it can't be that the machine has crapped out, it's too new.

Long story short.  I wiggle the blasted thing away from the wall, take off the back plate, dink around for a bit with my trusty screwdriver and flashlight, and find that one of the hoses needs serious tightening.  I get a wrench, tighten the hose, screw the plate back on, and screech and jiggle the 10-ton machine into its place.

Deep breath. 

Crossed fingers. 


I do the next load, towels wrapped like a winter scarf around the machine--just in case--and after running through a whole cycle...Eureka!!  No leaks, drips, soapy bubbles, or a glimmer of water.  I am now officially a Maytag Repairman.  I am not, however, calling this my Week Two adventure, regardless that it's a new thing I haven't done before.

The other f-word is fun and this definitely wasn't.



So, the positive in this debacle?  All the soapsuds helped clean the floor and both machines.  My laundry room is sparkling, and the machines look brand new.

And I also have some very inventive new words to use...you know, in case I write a story about trolls or ogres.