First of all, what kind of spell-check lets through the word “Peterbprough”?
Anyways. The story:
Around June 23rd or so we arrived in Peterborough and had a great first day visiting with my mom and step-dad Dave. We sat on the patio, chatted for a long time, and I drank more beer in one day than I had between January and June, but it was hot enough that I sweated it out faster than I could drink it, and didn’t get smashed and make an ass out of myself. Not even kidding. Even better, the storm clouds on the horizon waited for the end of our evening before rolling in with a HUGE rainstorm.
After saying our good nights, my mom showed Jeff & me to our room in the basement, which was amazing. It looked like one of those places that a designer had been called in to do. The only downside is that there were twin single beds, and we had to push them together- in the middle of the night I nearly fell through the middle. It’s a very good thing that I didn’t.
Just as we were about to turn out the lights, I plugged in the travel fan and all the lights went out. I freaked because I thought I’d blown every fuse in the house, but it turns out the storm killed everyone’s power. Mom came down to let us know, and we went to sleep listening to the storm. Very relaxing.
Aaaand then the shit hit the fan.
Mom & Dave’s place is about thirty feet from Buckhorn Lake, and the water table is amazingly high. So, Dave has always had a sump pump to keep his basement dry, and it works like a charm.
While there’s electricity to power it.
I was dead to the world, but when the power came back and our lights popped on, Jeff woke up immediately and went to turn them off. He hopped out of bed and landed in icy, ankle-deep water. If it were me, that’s when the cussing would have started, but Jeff just gave me a poke and asked me to get up and help him try to rescue stuff from the wet. Luckily the room or basement was on an angle and only half the room on an angle was underwater. Only a corner of our suitcase was soaked and our clothes were mostly okay. I nearly had a heart attack when I remembered that I’d left my iPhone on the floor on my side of the bed, but the water had only come up to within a few inches of it.
Anyway, mom was very Zen about the whole thing and so was Dave. They called a restoration company to rescue as much as they could, everything salvageable was packed away and the bedroom was torn out down to the studs.
The next night we slept in the sunroom, which was gorgeous and like camping but with sheets, and after another relaxing day we packed up and headed to Montreal.
Now, if you’re reading this you probably know me, and know I have a propensity for being a bit of an ass- if there’s a way to say something stupid or miscommunicate, I’ll find it.
We were doing the hugging goodbye thing and I said to mom “Well, I know you haven’t had a good visit with us”, meaning it sucked that she had to do all this crap with the flood while entertaining us. However, mom’s hearing sucks and she thought I’d said (after not being home for six years) “Well, you know we haven’t had a good visit,” and so she started crying.
Oy.
I straightened it out but it was a shitty way to end our first visit, and after visiting Montreal and Ottawa and coming back for another visit before flying out we made sure to make mom and Dave know how much we appreciated their hospitality and how much we loved staying with them.
Jeff was so anxious though, he kept breaking their stuff. We’re still looking for a replacement butter dish that he inadvertently spiked like a football.
