The one where Laurie shows you her apartment mops the universe.

Today was going to be the day. It really was. All day yesterday I worked spuriously (a combination of speedily and furiously--trust me, if you knew me in person you would give me this word, even in Scrabble--it's so me) to finish my work projects for the week. Due to a hard drive failure on my work computer, I had lost most of the data I need to complete what I had deemed my "to do" list for the weekend, so I spent countless hours reinventing the wheel.

I compiled the data I needed for a presentation I'll be doing later in the month and put together graphs and charts. I sorted through hundreds and hundreds of work photos and organized them into files. I also did a major update to the work website. All this in order to be able to spend today taking photos of my apartment to blog for you.

The day dawned bright and beautiful. It was cold, mind you, at least it felt cold to me on my morning walk. When I passed by the bank thermometer/clock thingy (that's the technical term for it--trust me) it said it was 28 degrees F, but it felt colder because there was a bit of a breeze.

After my walk, I made a crockpot of my soon-to-be famous spaghetti sauce and set about straightening up the apartment. I swept and mopped, I cleaned and organized. I put away the last couple of boxes from my move all the while jammin' to the tunes on XM Radio.

I also washed several loads of laundry. This is my cat Emily's favorite part of cleaning day because the washer and dryer are located right outside one of the doors to the apartment and she gets to run up and down the stairs and explore the hall to her hearts content while the clothes wash.

I was just finishing the vacuuming when I saw Emmy coming toward me. She was acting very strangely...shaking her feet as she walked. She had a peevish expression on her face and she was squeaking. Emmy doesn't meow, she squeaks...I'm pretty sure it's because she thinks she's a dog. She was raised by a border collie and a Welsh corgi and she hates cats. When she sees her own reflection in the full-length mirror, she puffs up and starts to hiss...I think she's a cog or maybe even a dat, but I digress...

I picked her up and to my shock, she was wet! Her pretty little white feet were filthy dirty and sopping wet. I put her down and followed her out into the hall where I saw a steady stream of water pouring out from under the door that connects my hallway to that of the hallway of the other apartment in the building. This hallway also houses the hot water heater and the **gasp** drain to my washing machine, which apparently was and had been for awhile, plugged! A tsunami of water came rushing down the hallway when I opened the door and water poured down the stairs of the building.

Crap! So much for my plans to take photos of my apartment today.

I turned off the washer, rolled up my sweatpants, gathered up a bucket (actually an aluminum turkey roasting pan I use for Chex Mix when my son is here--I promise I'll buy a new one Wolf) and my mop and set to work.

The apartment building is still a work in progress. Eventually there will be another tenant, but for now it's just me and Emmy. The contractor is in the process of remodeling and a lot of his things were in the room where the flood originated. I moved everything out so that I could begin to clean up the mess. Emmy, as you can see from the photo below, didn't really mind wandering the soggy halls. Doesn't she know that cats hate water?


Numerous hours and too many gallons of water to count later, my job was finished. Me, being me and all, decided that just mopping up the flood wasn't enough, I had to go back through and mop it all with lysol so it wouldn't smell "funky" after it dried.

While the hallway may not have smelled funky, I can't say the same for my feet. Can you see how dirty they are? (Nice red toenails though, don't you think?)

Not to worry, I just dipped them in the bathroom sink and washed them off. I was quite surprised to see how easily I was able to put my foot up there. Losing weight has really paid off for me, don't you think? ha!!! (By the way, for those of you totally disgusted with me for using the sink this way, please know that I cleaned and disinfected it thoroughly after taking this picture)

So anyway, my motives were pure and I really meant to post "the one where Laurie shows you her apartment", but the floodwaters prevented me from doing so. I will leave you with a photo of my beautiful (at least I think it's beautiful) bedroom. It's so warm and cozy and comfy I look forward to going to bed at night for the first time in a very long time.

I really will post pictures of the rest of the place next weekend. I promise. Unless, of course, I'm visited by a plague of locusts.