Good morning all. I hope you are rested and refreshed from your weekend. I am feeling fantastic. The rain has cleared and even though it is hot, the world feels a little less swamp like than it did last week. Last week it felt as though we were becoming a rainforest. But it is time to start a new week so lets start it with a fresh new writing prompt. Ready? Fabulous. Let’s go.
This one turned out kind of so so. I might be able to use it in the future, but I don’t really see the story it could go into. However my brain does feel a bit more awake, and that was the point, so at least the prompt did it’s job.
Monday, June 14th: The pipes rattled ominously.
The pipes rattled ominously. I knew what that meant. My hot water supply was about to go out. Again. I reached for the taps and turned off the water before the heat my skin pulled from my morning shower could be blasted away by the freezing droplets.
I knew the water heater needed to be replaced. I had been preparing for it a while now. The money was put by, the model chosen and in short everything needed to replace it was ready. Unfortunately winter came early and hit hard this year.
A sale was starting and even though I saved enough to be able to purchase it without the sale price money was always tight and shaving a little off of the price tag would let me put the excess towards other much needed repairs. So I waited for the sale to start. Three days before the sale started the first of the winter storms blew in. The world around us was coated with a thick layer of ice.
I ordered the water heater during the sale and received the discount. It was shipped but by the time it made it to the post office at the bottom of the mountain the thick sheet of ice that glazed the world, or at least our part of it, was buried under two feet of snow.
Ernie called me to let me know it arrived at the post office. He also let me know that deliveries would have to wait until the weather cleared. At the moment the snowplows weren’t heading up in to the mountains. He would look for a break in the weather and send it along as soon as possible.
While there were breaks in the weather, none of them lasted long enough to actually get the roads cleared and allow transport of my new water heater. So I was making do with the old one. It was becoming more and more of a challenge with each day that passed. I Stepped out of the shower and reached for my towel. I dried myself off and glanced to the small digital clock I placed beside the sink. My hot shower lasted a full minute and a half less than the day before.
I shook my head and continued drying myself. I had a full day ahead of me and couldn’t afford to wallow. I dressed and left the bathroom, the remaining steam of my shower puffing through the door with me as I stepped back into the bedroom. People always thought that as the hotel wasn’t open in the winter months there was nothing to do up here, that we had all the free time in the world.
While there were no guests to take care of, the winter was almost busier than the summer for us. This was the time when all of the necessary repairs were done. As soon as the last guest checked out, repairs were made to the outside of the building. They needed to be complete before winter made working outside impossible. Every tiny detail was seen to and in those first few weeks the days started at sun up and often ended with tasks being completed by flashlight after the sun went down.
This year we barely managed to squeak through the exterior work before winter arrived a few weeks early. Now, the long list of interior issues awaited each morning. While the water heater for the staff quarters was important, at the moment I could do nothing about that.
‘But the banquet chairs aren’t going to reupholster themselves,” I told myself as I walked to the kitchen and reached for my travel coffee mug. As I showered the pot brewed.
Ten til Midnight 