The great flood

I came home late tonight, exhausted and feeling depressed and homesick. I wanted nothing more than to get to bed quickly and forget everything in deep sleep. I threw my purse on the kitchen table, jammed my keys into my pocket, and went straight to my bedroom. As I stepped into my room, I felt a cold wetness seeping up my socks. My floor had become a pool.

Apparently, the toilet in my bathroom has not yet learned when it should stop refilling. And apparently, my bedroom and bathroom floors slant inward toward my bed. About an inch of water had collected there. I didn't have a clue how to mop it up. All of my towels were at the laundry mat, I had no desire to soil my few remaining articles of clean clothing, and unlike Curious George, I knew of no neighbor with a pump. I grabbed a broom and tried pushing the water toward the drain in the bathroom, but that meant sweeping it uphill around three right angles. It wasn't too cooperative.

Finally, I resorted to sweeping the water into a dustpan and then dumping it into a bucket. Although the floor looked no different, I felt rather triumphant after the first bucketful:



After sweeping up as much as I possibly could, I tried to mop up the rest by skating around on T-shirts. T-shirts, I discovered, are not too absorbent, despite their 100%-cotton labels.

Now I am sitting on my bed, and I feel almost like I am on an island. I hope the rest of the water will air dry while I am away tomorrow. Strangely, enough, my spirits are greatly improved. Nothing like sweeping five gallons of water into a bucket to lighten the mood, I suppose.