Black cats, Broken Mirrors

Note: Sorry, this turned rather long while I was writing it. You can skim to the end and get the summary if you want...or read on, and grab a seat, it'll be a while.

Fine, I'll stop yelling at you. Just leave me alone!

I've been searching all week for the mirror I must have broken on Sunday. I also have tried to find the black cat that I crossed one too many times to try and apologize.  Apparently I pissed it off royally and have been paying the price since Monday.

Well, that can't be good.

Are you confused yet? Well, let me explain how our week, ahem, my week has gone. To say that it's been interesting would be an understatement.

On Monday, after having my hands full of stuff, I apparently hit the button on the tailgate and left the trunk wide open in the parking garage. Genius. Luckily, one of my co-workers knew it was my car and shut the trunk...of course she hadn't seen me all morning and wasn't able to tell me until the afternoon. I ran out to check on everything, just to make sure and all was good. It had locked after she shut it and everything, including my emergency kit was all still present. Phew.  This was Stage 1 of my dumbness this week: not only does my car ding when the trunk closes, but also when it opens. Hello?!? What was I doing that I couldn't hear my trunk? Plus, it doesn't honk when its locked until everything is intact. Dumb me.

Also, I didn't tell Tony for fear of the wrath of the Italian....let's hope he doesn't read this entry. (Read: in-laws and readers, please refrain from mentioning this post when Tony is in the room!)

Tuesday came and I had to fly to Atlanta for a one day meeting...can you sense my excitement to fly out for a meeting that was only one day? I was pumped.  It wasn't too bad since I flew with my boss and another colleague. However, to make a good impression on your boss, showing how responsible you really are, I would suggest not doing the following: losing your license while you get on the plane.

Yep. I managed to get through security, and had to go through the big x-ray machine (good thing I wore clean underwear, you never know what they see) and have all my stuff. We made it perfect time to board the airplane. This is when it all went oh so wrong. I put my ID in my back pocket since my wallet was in the bottom of my bag, thinking I'll just put it in my wallet when I sit down. This is a problem when your license somehow comes out of your pants from the time you went through security to the time when you begin to panic and beg the flight attendants to let you go and look.

After the nice attendants on the plane let me go and look, all while telling me I had 30 seconds to go and look, which means, run like hell up the jet way thing, it took all of my willpower to not burst into tears. Yes, I am a cryer 94% of the time when things happen. I had enough time to go and ask the gate attendant, who was oh so helpful (um, no) when I asked her if she found a license, and one security guard, who actually was most helpful - honest, he even began to look in all the bins, probably because he could see the color draining in my face (yes, it is possible to look white as a ghost when your Mexican, its about the only time my Irish side really comes out). No such luck. My license is gone. Crap.

I guess at least I was on the plane. I immediately called Tony, whose voice can also make me cry, not for any reason other than its familiar, told him what happened and then had to hang up since we were taking off. Double crap. So he gathered up my passport, an old Kansas drivers license and our marriage certificate to overnight to me. He then called the office to see if they knew what hotel I was staying at so he could get it over to me. After doing so, he made sure to call my sister and mom and tell me what an idiot I am. Minus husband points.

You're probably wondering why he sent over the marriage certificate. Well, you know when you get married and you have to change over all of your information to your new married name? Well, I did most of that, except my passport. Yep, dumb. Because it had my maiden name on it he had to send the marriage license. Oh and to add to the fun, it was also expired. Dumb times three.

Lucky for us, he made it just in time for delivery. Crisis somewhat averted.

You would think that my dumbness ended there - nope. I even managed to forget my scarf while at dinner. Ugh. Seriously? And no, I am not pregnant, which is a question I got while at this meeting. Thankfully, my boss found it, and just laughed at my stupidity.

So all fingers and toes were crossed getting to the airport hoping to make it though security. I think I found the nice TSA man who took all of expired information and let me pass.

YES!!!!!!!!!!! Phew. I've never been so excited to make it through a security line. Of course I started worrying about my ticket being marked with something that said, "watch out, this one equals trouble and she's Mexican." But I didn't get stopped again and made it aboard the plane with everything.

But my fun week doesn't end there. Oh no, why wouldn't my great luck continue into the evening?!?

Since Tony left earlier that day to go out of town, Tyson and I had the evening to go to bed early and curl up letting the snow fall. We went upstairs early, since Tyson was already snoring downstairs and got ready for bed. Well, the guard dog that Ty man is, started staring at our dresser. Hard core staring. And that's when we heard a couple of popping noises. At first thinking it was the TV, I let it go, but Ty kept staring at the dresser, which of course freaked me out. So I investigated and looked on the dresser and then behind it, when I saw the spark fly out of the outlet behind the WOOD dresser.

I may not capture Christmas light thieves, but I do catch electricity fires!

Freak out can't even begin to describe what happened. Immediately I called Tony, who was basically helpless in Dallas, who called his Dad, and I called mine, who then called my brother, the firefighter.

Hello burnt outlet cover.

There were lots of tears, phone calls, and at least 20 minutes that I stared at the outlet to make sure it wasn't burning any more.  After turning off the power, I continued to stare at the outlet, which looked charred and bubbly, with my flashlight until I felt like I could go downstairs.

My brother made the trek all the way to our house, which of course was complicated by the freaking snow, and came to help what he thought would just be changing the outlet. Joke was on him. He walked in and immediately said, "Yep, this is what a fired smells like."

Heroes wear camo while changing outlets.

Awesome.

After taking out the outlet, realizing the  little holder of the outlet was all melted, charred up the the stud in the wall and even up the cord, the decision was made I would not stay there.  Of course I had made that decision when the outlet popped.

Our crisp outlet.

Grabbing everything that was 'important,' Tyson, my wedding rings, my earring, a ring from my Grandma, my computer and my camera case, we were off. Slumber party at Nana & Grampa's!

Slumber party fun!

To say that we were very lucky would be an understatement.  We definitely had someone watching over us to make sure all was safe and sound. Ryan did as much as he could with the outlet and we had a electrician friend come over today and figure out the problem. Diagnosis: stupid people who put in the wrong outlets while building the addition. Well, it's probably more complicated than that, but that's my diagnosis.

Hopefully the broken mirror, the black cats and any other bad superstition has ended with me now. I mean, nothing horrible happened on Friday the 13th, but I also heard that Friday the 13th is nothing to be scared of when you're a Mexican. So at least I got that going for me, now, it's just time to change all of the outlets and move.