Splish-Splash

So the theme for this week appears to be "water damage," because I can't do anything the easy way.   Wednesday night I was in the middle of packing and completing my list of "Chores To Do Before Traveling," one of which was to get the checkbooks balanced.  And so I did--but not before scooting my checkbook off my desk and directly into the full basin of water in which I had just been soaking my toe as per the podiatrist's instructions. 

For a split-second I didn't think much about it, expecting simply to lean over and pick the checkbook back off the floor.  Then I saw its trajectory.  Imagine a cartoon character leaning over in slow motion and yelling "Noooooooooooooooo!" while trying to arrest the flight of the finances.  Because that was me, at least until my checkbook reached escape velocity and hit the water with a resounding "thwack" like some chubby kid doing a belly flop in the pool at the local Y.  Sigh.

I snatched the checkbook out of the tub as quickly as possible, but not before the water had started seeping into the check register and making the ink muddy on some of the pages.  Nothing like a little salt water to enhance one's reading experience.  On the plus side, I no longer needed to worry about any airborne banking infections since my supply of checks had just been summarily doused in water laced with Betadine. 

Fortunately I was able to dry off enough of the register to make it still legible, though the checks themselves had already started to curl.  I finished--carefully--balancing the checkbooks (at least it was mine that got doused and not the hubby's) and then set the cover, checkpad and register up to dry while I was gone.

Fast forward to today.  Because I'm supposed to soak this toe at least once a day for two weeks, I had to find some sort of basin in which to do so while visiting the girlie, since I didn't feel the overwhelming need to carry the one at home through the airport.  Sadly, my hotel room lacks any functional device short of a trash can (which would probably render any and all antiseptics and sterility entirely moot) and a large cooking pan in the kitchenette.  Somehow I doubt future guests would appreciate cooking in a pan in which my foot had been soaked.  So we hit the nearest CVS and found a plastic container which would work.  The fact that it had handles on it and would most likely be used to ice down beers for a pool party was irrelevant. 

When we got back to my hotel, the girlie sat on the couch to sew and watch TV.  I went into the handicapped bathroom (irony, anyone?) to fill the tub.  Because the bathroom had a handicapped shower, it also came equipped with a handy-dandy sprayer.  I sat the tub on the sink, turned on the water, and started to fill the tub while holding onto the sprayer.  Soon it became evident that the sprayer was content to lie face-down in the tub and stay put, so I left it and went to put on my pajamas.  Big mistake.  While my back was turned, the spray flipped itself over, also in a very comedic, cartoonish way, and started spewing water halfway across the bathroom like one of those fountain shows at the Opryland Hotel.

I rushed back in and grabbed the sprayer, pointing it back down into the tub, then surveyed the damage while the tub finished filling.  Water was dripping down the mirror and onto the cheap hotel tissue box and puddling under half my toiletries.  There was also an impressive spray of water dotting the closet door in the bathroom, and the bra I had hanging on the door handle had one cup darker than the other from the drenching.  I was likewise soggy by the time I'd regained control of the errant super soaker.

A half an hour later everything was cleaned back up and drying out, and my foot was safely brewing in the bin, papers and belongings on the desk carefully pushed back out of potential dunking range.   Let's just hope that the rest of my visit with the girlie goes a bit more smoothly--and drily.