Wet dog???? Or Iron.

We have no shiny interweb at home. This is because we'd rather spend the money on, say, more games and/or Terry Pratchett books. But it means that we have to come into work to use the interweb. (Go, University T1 connection!)

So, I came in this afternoon, figuring maybe I should catch up to the 11 days of no-email before I go back to work tomorrow. Discover that no one has emptied the bucket in the hallway from another leak. (Not the one in my office) So I decide to empty it. It's a 5-gallon bucket that's about 1/2 full of water and ....other things. I think that it was a trash bucket before it became a leak bucket. I'm not sure that it was really emptied of trash before being repurposed. But I'm not about to fish all that junk out of the water with my hand. So I dump the contents into the sink in the secret bathroom. (More on that in a minute) It begins draining slowly, and then yet more slowly. Eventually the "draining water" noise stops and I go take a look. The sink is still half full of water and ....other things. The water is not moving. The drain is making dripping noises. The room smells revoltingly of wet dog. I spool about 4 1/2 feet of paper towel out of the dispenser and try to sort of swish is through the water without getting my hand wet. The water begins to move a bit. It stops moving again when there's about an inch of water left. This time, I figure there's no hope for it and my hand gets wet. I wipe most of the sludge off of the drain. The closer I get to the sink, the worse it smells. It starts to smell like iron in addition to wet dog. I choose to believe that it smells mostly like iron. I get more towel and wipe out more sludge. The rest of the water drains away. The smell has not abated. I wash my hands with really hot water and industrial soap. Then I come out here and write this LJ for your reading enjoyment!

Sorry about that. I'm not yet sure that I like 'cuts' in LJ entries, but I suppose some folks might prefer that I had put that behind one. At any rate....the deal with the secret bathroom is that our office used to be a movie projectionist's booth. As such, and since we're pretty much isolated on the 3rd floor, there's a bathroom up here so that the projectionist wouldn't have to leave his/her post. We win, becuase the nearest convenient bathrooms are on the 1st floor and are usually full of students. Most other people a) don't know that it's here and b) wouldn't come all the way up here in any case.

Oh yeah...holidays!

That's what I was going to write about before I got distracted by that bucket of water.

We had a nice time in VT. pirateofcatan's mother and sister were no less crazy than usual. Then we came back home and have been just kind of hanging around for a few days. I've been making curtians for the kitchen. Living room is next. We spent a bunch of money. (Most of it given to us). We go back to work tomorrow.

Finally saw the Harry Potter movie and were unimpressed. I think I prefer just reading the books---and because the books are so recent, I feel like the directors are tied down by a feeling that they have to be absolutely loyal to the book. Honestly, this one would have been better if they'd just cut things wholesale. (Apologies to anyone who really, really loves the movies!)

I have ironing to do. Our apartment has a fold-down ironing board. We both think this is cool, even though we hardly ever iron. It has a sleeve board, too, but it needs a new cover. The apartment also has a milk-delivery door, although the building has since been reconfigured and now the other side of that door is in our furnace closet. But in the summer, it's a great place to store candy. (For those who have never had the joy of living somewhere with a milk-delivery door, it's basically a wee little door cut into the wall, with a latching handle on both sides. The inside, which is only as thick as the wall, is insulated and is where the milkman would leave milk bottles.)