After a relaxing, rather uneventful birthday– I’m not sure what I expected when I got up this morning… but being that my life follows the Big Brother slogan, “Expect the Unexpected”… I should have been prepared.

We decided to have a few people over tomorrow evening for New Year’s Eve and Michael and I were discussing it this morning before he left for work. I decided to run to Jewel and get some salt for the driveway because the back was a solid sheet of ice.

I warmed up the car and pulled around to the front gate but it wouldn’t open. I thought the battery in the remote was frozen but it was lighting up. It took me a few moments to notice some of the Christmas lights outside were also off, so I figured the breaker must have flipped.

I went back in to tell Michael he might have to use the other gate, checked the breaker and it just kept tripping when I tried to reset it. Oh well, I figured I’d try and fix it later.

So, I went and got salt. I came back home, got out of the car to close the back gate…. then BAM! Full body-slam on the ice. Luckily, I was wearing my puffy coat and my ski cap (which Michael refers to as Pippi Longstocking) and they thankfully cushioned my fall. I wasn’t hurt– just a little rattled. I spread the salt and went about my day.

When I got around to messing with the breaker again, I figured one of my light connections outside might be continuing to trip it, so I disconnected them. Of course I was wondering, Why couldn’t this have happened AFTER New Years? Because now I had to get the lights working again for our guests coming over tomorrow night expecting to see them.

I went back in to get some things so I could try switching out some cords. While I was there, I decided to plug in the big Christmas tree and… nothing.

N-O-T-H-I-N-G.

What?!?

Yes, after checking all the breaker boxes– The outlet was on the same breaker as the gate and the outlet the lights were plugged in to outside. What idiot wired this place? (The trials and tribulations of an old house.)

I went back out, put down the cords, noticed the ice wasn’t melting enough– and I let my ADD take over and I was back on the road to get for more salt. But, instead of going back to Jewel, where I knew they had salt… I decided to waste an hour of my time, driving from place to place to find that it (the salt) was either way overpriced or sold out. (Thank you Ace Hardware and Home Depot!) So I ended up– back at Jewel– for more salt. (I cleaned them out.)

I got back home, spread more salt… now totaling around 200 lbs!

Oh wait, what was I doing?

Oh yeah, then back to my lights. I re-ran cords, connected them to a different outlet… lights working… done.

Back inside…. re-ran the cord through the foyer to a different outlet… big Christmas tree… working.

Breaker…

Not working. Fried. Dead…. and no remote gate. (Sigh.)

The ice did start to melt in the driveway but I put down another 25 lbs in the heavier areas anyway.

So, basically… I spent the whole day just to get back to where I was when I went to bed the night before.

What next?

Oh yeah… it’s snowing again.

More shoveling, more salt ahead.

Just another typical day.