a birthday and a bathroom

Friday was Taryn's birthday. She had wanted to go ice skating with two girl friends (and maybe her family), and the rink was open on Saturday. On Monday the girls' father said they were permitted to go, but he didn't know if they already had plans. On Tuesday he thought they could go. By Thursday he wasn't sure, and Friday morning he said they couldn't make it. So she was disappointed, and in an effort to cheer her up we decided to go out for Krispy Kreme for breakfast - but not all the other doughnut shops in town as we did last year.

As the boys did their chores and we got ready to go, I cleaned the main bathroom. The toilet has been leaking, and I gagged every time the door was open, so I just had to clean it before we left. Seeing up close how bad it was, I declared that I would not come back home without a new wax ring (assuming the old one had smooshed or rotted and that's why it was leaking). Bob answered that he had recently changed the ring - we needed to get a whole new toilet.

So into town on the coldest day of the week. We got free hot doughnuts and bought a dozen. The new chocolate cheesecake ones are a lot better than the cheesecake ones they had last year. We thought we might get a new mattress for Taryn as her present - she's had the same mattress since... we bought that bed used 10 years ago, and it became hers 7-8 years ago. So it was past due. Went to one mattress store and she liked the first one she tried, but liked the next one better, and the third was great (but over $100 more). So I suggested we try another store. Meanwhile, Bob took William to a used game store to spend Christmas money on Wii Sports Resort. The second mattress store had a bigger selection of cheap twin mattresses, and she found one that she adored. (Just happened to be the same one the other customer liked). The salesman gave us $140 off the marked sale price, and we bought it.

Then we had lunch at Jim's Razorback Pizza in Lowell, which was pretty good, and reasonably priced. I drank soda with my lunch special - the first full glass I've had in quite a while. It tasted good, but didn't wow me. After lunch we went on to Fayetteville to the music store and to pick up the mattress at another location of the same chain. And we also went to Lowe's for the new toilet - we got the cheaper of the two chair-height rounded front toilets they carry. Got home at almost dark, but Taryn still managed to get Bob to grill burgers for supper (in the cold and wind).

And then we took out the old toilet. Oh, dear! This really deserves its own post, but I guess that will come. First, we noticed that it was gross. Second, it was really gross!! Okay, sorry. There's just no way to describe the smell or the revulsion of "brown water" inside my house. Right. The ring wasn't in bad shape, and the toilet didn't appear cracked. But the plastic thing that holds it all together was in bad shape. The drain pipe is lead. The rim of the pipe which is supposed to overlap with the wax and the toilet was broken, thus our leak. Based on visual cues, Bob decided to cut out the linoleum from around the toilet. And that's when IT began in earnest. The floor was rotten. After much deliberation, hammering, and poking around, we decided to go ahead and fix it rather than patch it with a proverbial bandaid and put it off.

And that gets its own post.