Ten minutes of extreme

Other than the customary difficulty sleeping, Alec's week away has been relatively uneventful. My sleepiness led to a couple of misplaced items - my American Express card and Lindsay's mittens, but otherwise a pretty quiet week.

I have class on Saturday mornings, so our babysitter was due to arrive at 8:30 AM. Lindsay was still quiet in her room, and Lauren was playing her new Leapster game (Thanks, Tutu!) she opened last night for Hanukkah. I'd made what I thought was a quick trip to the bathroom, was about to retrieve Lindsay so that both girls were dressed and eating breakfast when Kristin arrived.

Alas, no.

I flushed the toilet and washed my hands, puzzled by the continual sound of running water after I'd turned off the tap. I turned to see water pouring out over the toilet seat, about 2 inches already on the floor. "Holy socks!" I exclaimed, grabbing the plunger I freed the clogged toilet paper and watched as the water went back down the drain. I grabbed rag towels out of the closet to wipe up the water. Three thirsty bath towels later, I was down to the rag hand towels and the toilet was still dripping. I turned the water off, drained the tank, and dried all of the top surfaces of the toilet, but it was still dripping. I put a dry towel under the drip, retrieved Lindsay, and met Kristin at the door with a diaper-clad toddler.

"Just don't use the upstairs toilet," I said as cheerfully as I could muster. I changed Lindsay into her clothes as Kristin began preparing the requested breakfast - oatmeal with raisins and walnuts. I sped out of the driveway with my laptop on the front seat thinking about that drip, puzzling over where the water was coming from. The water's off, I thought. And the tank is dry. Could something have broken? Silly, it was just an overflow.

When I arrived home, sure enough, the drip had stopped. I turned the water on, refilled the tank, and gave the toilet a few flushes. It was fine. I breathed a sigh of relief. Besides having to bring a heavy basket of saturated bath towels to the basement to wash, it was a pretty harmless event.