Flash Burn

Well.  Last night was a treat.

A pleasure, if you will.

During the day, David and the boys were working outside all day.  Kate and I were cleaning inside.  Hadley was off flitting about.

Kate informed me that the downstairs toilet was clogged.  I asked her to remedy the situation.  She objected. Because she didn’t do it. I denied her objection, because I don’t care who did it,  and asked her to take care of it.

My kids all have plunger-phobia.  What this means is they are fearful of using a plunger for reasons that no one in the world will ever understand.  So, I offer an alternative, which is an idea I found on the Pinterest, where you put hot soapy water in the toilet for awhile and it will unclog magically on its own.  So, Kate did that and then I forgot about it.

And then David and the boys came in and Kate’s boyfriend came over and we played games and ate dinner.  I made Shepherd’s Pie, but HD calls it German Pie.  And then Hadley and Lily came over and somehow there was pizza involved and David and I were just trying to go to bed, although I will admit I was surely jealous that no one offered me pizza.

I was all set up with an ice machine on my knee and David was starting to sleep.

And then.

All heck broke loose.

The downstairs erupted with shouting and drama.  Apparently the puppies had gotten into the toilet.  The toilet that was clogged.  The toilet that was never unclogged.  And the puppies helped themselves to the contents of the toilet and smeared said contents all about the bathroom.

And it is no one’s fault and no one did it and why shouldn’t any one specific child be responsible to clean this atrocity up?  And I am embarassed, nay, HORRIFIED, that we have two guests in our home with all this going on.

At LITERALLY the same exact time, David wakes up and says his eyes hurt.

Me:  Why do your eyes hurt?

David:  I don’t know!

Me:  What do you need?

David:  Nothing!

So, I go back to the children/puppy/poopy mess.  And no one still did and no one should have to clean it up, because, gross, Mom.

Now, David has gotten out of bed.  But he was stumbling around and could not see.

Me:  David!

David:  What!

Me:  What can I do?  Should we go to the doctor?

David:  NO!  I’m fine.

The poopy puppies get all cleaned up and children are all irritated at each other and the mysterious toilet clogger person who didn’t remedy their clog in the first place.

Hadley:  Mom.  I would own up to it, if I did it.  It was impressive.  That poo surely would have set a world record or something.  I wouldn’t deny it if it was me.

 

Meanwhile, David is not doing well.  His eyes are burning and he is in pain.  I am being a doting, albeit annoying, wife.

Can you see?  Did you get anything in it?  Can I look?  Should we wash out your eyes?  Do you need ice?  Shall I get you some pain medicine?  Should we go to the ER?

Finally, he said we should to to the ER.

Things still weren’t peaceful and harmonic at Le House of Poo, so David said to me, and I quote:

“Will these kids be ok if we just leave them here?”

And I lied, and I quote:

“Oh, yes.  They will be fine!”

And then I summoned all the children for a Come to Jesus meeting because they had to get over the poo-saster and live in harmony so I could drive their father to the ER because he was probably going blind for reasons we did not know.

As I was driving him, I was going through the day and trying to figure out what could have been different.  I had rubbed some new arthritis cream on my knee and was trying to figure out if there was any way I could have gotten some in his eyes.

Me:  David.  Did you weld today?

David:  Yeah.  Hours ago.

Me:  Did you use your face shield thingie?

David:  Yeah.

We get to the ER.  He literally cannot use his eyes.  I have to guide him in and the first thing the nurse says to him was-

“Ok!  Did you do any welding today?”

And he told her did and admitted he took off his shield for just a bit.  And then because of the ‘Rona, I had to leave him and wait in the car.  So I went to the car and tried to google-

“Do people go blind from welding?”

Because, seriously.  Something was not right.  And then I was trying to imagine a world where David was blind.  And that would be sad and unfortunate, but also highly exasperating because every day would look something like this:

Me:  Remember, David?  You are blind?

David:  I can still castrate this calf!  Hand me a knife!

And I would have my hands full for all eternity and he would always be fussy.

They did determine it was Flash Burn from welding.  He was given pain meds and eye cream.  I was only able to get him to admit he could not work because he could not see, and luckily, he felt that he probably could not drive to work if he could not see.

I went to bed, scared he was going to not be able to see.  But when he woke up, he could see, and everything is fine and the downstairs toilet is unclogged and now very clean.

The End.