Trials and More Trials . .

My three biggest pots are on the stove, full of water that I'm trying to get to boil. Why? So that Keith and I can carry them all into the bathroom to fill up the bathtub so the girls don't have to take baths in freezing cold water.

Our water heater has ceased to heat water. And it is leaking. We discovered this yesterday morning while I shivered and whined through a very c-o-l-d shower upstairs. The good news is, we got one of those insurance deals with the house where major appliances like that are covered in the first year or so. The bad news? They can't get out here to replace the heater until Monday. No hot water, all weekend long.

Our water heater in Jersey died at the beginning of the summer, too. And not only did we have to pay for a new one, but somehow the new heater would not fit in the space where the old one had been. Apparently, the builders installed the water heater and built the room around it . . very tightly. Oddly enough, though, the next larger model would fit. So, we had to buy a new and bigger water heater. Yeesh.

Our humidifier has also not been working here for the last month. A man came out yesterday morning to look at it--it just needed a new valve of some kind. He replaced it and cheerfully presented me with a $250 bill. Good grief! We could have bought a brand new humidifier for that price!

And then there's the saga of Keith's car. Soon after he got here in August, the transmission went out (thank you, Lord, that it didn't happen on his drive here!). There's only one guy in town who does much work on Mercedeses--a man Keith heard was very nice, good, but very slow. No lie. Keith didn't get his car back until a week ago. He not only had to pay an exorbitant amount to get the car fixed, he also had to pay for a rental car the whole time it was being worked on.

I know I shouldn't complain. Really, I shouldn't. We've had some real financial blessings in the last few months -- like that fact that we sold our house for a relatively decent price, in only a couple months, in a terrible market. But seriously . . it feels sometimes like nothing is going our way. Everything has to be expensive and difficult. As if we have money and patience to burn.

I'm sure there's a lesson in here somewhere. Some profound point I could make to enlighten all of our lives. Maybe I'll think of one while I'm boiling more water to wash the dinner dishes.