Talk about days going quickly.....
It seems like it was only a few days ago that I posted about time flying by. And it is almost two weeks. Oh Well....much going on in the Hume Home.....mostly the soap opera kind of thing....you know the adventures that we are bound to have while the rest of the world watches and smiles.
We are having to work though our son's divorce, both mentally and emotionally and at the same time move our vacation plans around. It has been extremely hard on him and we have tried to help as much as we can long distance. We have also had to let him work through his own desires as to how and what to do. And that is probably the hardest part of the process. I firmly believe that all things happen for a reason. Always have. Always will. We may not ever know what that reason is....but in the long run.... it is for the good.
The long and short of the vacation plans.....We and the family here, are now on our way to Hawaii. We were all going to England but the divorce put the end to that. So instead of going to the east from here to dreary ol England, we are off to the west and the sunny beaches of the Big Island. Sun Sand & Sea that is the vacation for ME! We are looking into all the things that can be done on the Big Island. Neither Tom nor I have been there. We have made many trips to Kauai and feel almost at home there. Knowing where we want to go and how to get there. So now we are on to some new territory. Maybe we will find somewhere we want to visit again and again. We will be going in July. So start looking for posts later in the summer.
Speaking of summer....it has slammed into us with a ton of humidity. In the last few days, we have had RAIN by the barrels full. And with all the rain has come Storms! Thunder! Lightning! Wind. Now the heat. You know that it can not be good when the temperature is 75 at 10 o'clock at night and the humidity is 85%!
We have personally dealt with the lightning! I had a great opportunity to sleep in and was very rudely awaken by a bolt of lightning quickly followed by deafening thunder and the alarm siren going off at 7am. I hurriedly put my code in and........nothing happened. The siren is so loud that it is hard to be near enough to do anything. But after several attempts at putting in a code and punching every button.....I called the alarm company on the wired phone and used the speaker part as I did not think I wanted to be touching anything wired because of all the lightning. Good Idea.....!!!! As I was talking to the owner of the company (having rudely awaken him) I got a very small part of the directions for turning off the siren before another lightning strike took out the phone! Good thing I did not have a hold of the phone! But I still had the alarm to deal with. I did get the start of the instructions and unloosened the screw holding the alarm box to the wall.......and promptly dropped the box on my foot.....stopping the siren and breaking a toe! Silence.....well.....except for my wonderful voice proclaiming loudly! OUCH! and a couple of other words not to be repeated!!
Now, I had to deal with the phones being out. Our cell service is okay outside the house, but really bad inside. I was not going outside and hold onto any device that could act as an antenna! I opened my cell, laid it on the kitchen counter, got the best signal possible and called the phone company....I hate automated systems! After being dropped three times, I finally got a live person who completed the work order. She asked if I had a wired phone, would I be able to go out and check to see if the trouble was coming to the house or in the house. Sure....most of the storm was past and now it was just a torrential downpour.... I would drown first, not be fried by lightning. Out the garage door I went to the side of the house.....one look and no doubt why I did not have a phone. The phone box was blown apart! And there were at least two very burnt and melted parts on the ground. Back inside for me...... and the service order was on the way. Needless to say, I had my doubts about getting anything done for the day but I was not going anywhere either.
The repairman did show up rather quickly and the line was burnt and as far as he could, he replaced it. (They do not work on anything inside the walls!) He checked the lines in the house for me......and we don't have phone lines in parts of the house! Nothing in the basement.....none in the kitchen and the other side of the wall. The phone part of the answering machine and the base of the wireless system are gone. So we are down to two wired phones on the main floor. My first job for next day was to take care of the phones...... Luckily, for years at the first sounds of thunder, I have been turning off the computer and unplugging it from everything. Electric, phone and cable. I also do that with my quilting machine and sewing machines. So the computer, laptop, and all my sewing/quilting machines are going to be fine. And this week, I have been doing that with the TVs
The next morning we woke up to......no water pressure! Okay...that means no laundry, dish washer, and no shower. For one day that will not be so bad but not much longer than one day. My best friend called and she did not have any pressure either. We each called the water company and found out that they were not exactly sure where the leak was. And were having a hard time finding it because of all the rain. NO LIE!!! Boy, did that take a genius to figure out. If it was not shooting 10 feet in the air, there was no way to tell a leak from the 4 inches of rain. There is water everywhere!!
Not 30 minutes later my friend calls back and wants to know if I have Internet..... Hers is always going out. I check and I am still online.....does she have TV? No...I do....so the problem is not here. Her problem is almost always too much strength for the router and cable modem. She has to turn off everything. Wait 10 minutes. Then she has to reboot the whole system. Which takes about 45 minutes total. With no luck getting any thing back......she is on the phone again to call the cable company....who know her personally by now.
I have a bunch of errands to do, so I leave as I don't want to know about anything else going wrong. Some time late in the day, the water comes back on. When I get back I have the dishwasher and the washer going immediately. And we now have a new answering/wireless system with three handsets that is expandable to 12! So, we will have to use those in the basement, kitchen and living room. But at least we will have phones again.
Tom and I decide to go out for pizza (all you can eat night) and as we are getting ready to go out the door...... Can you guess?? The electric goes out! YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING!!! First everything just dims down to very low....and in a matter of minutes....out completely! But I have phones and am on it almost immediately... after turning off the computer. Guess that I was the first person to call because the lady did not seem to upset about it. Took the information and 'we will send a repairman out'. We went off to pizza hoping that they still had electricity. We had a very nice dinner with some friends and on the way home learned that the sub-station went down and there were 2100 homes without electricity and they were 'working feverishly' to get it fixed. ( I know that I would be working as fast as possible...otherwise, as more and more people got home.... they also would be calling about the outage! All 2100 homes! ) We got electricity back about 30 minutes later.

Are these the plagues of the new age??!! NO Phone. NO Water. NO TV. NO Internet. NO Electricity. Not exactly locust, frogs, etc. But very effective in getting my attention. How about you??