SUDS

Before I begin my little story, I want to ask those who can spare a moment to please continue to Keep Curtis and Ellen in your thoughts. Curtis gives a heart wrenching update on her condition. He could do with any support you can give as he sits at Ellens bedside.

And now...

Heidi, our almost seventeen year old daughter, loaded the dishwasher. She has done it a thousand times. Today, she started to put regular dish soap in the dispenser. She realized her mistake and stopped after the first squirt. She then proceeded to top up the dispenser with the correct dishwasher liquid. She shut the door turned it on and off she went.


I walk into the kitchen 15 minutes later to a surreal scene.


You know in movies and cartoons how someone puts too much soap in the washer and bubbles and foam fill up the house? Yep, its not the Hollywood special effects exaggeration that I had always held it to be. My kitchen floor was flooded and foam was seeping from the edges of the dishwasher door. I stopped the machine and ran to get towels. After mopping up the lake off the floor, I opened the dishwasher! It was FULL of bubbles which sprang out at me when I opened the door which had been keeping them restrained. I thought I had died and gone to heaven as I was enveloped in a cloud of white fluff. I think the cat had been behind me a moment before and now all I could hear was a plaintive wail coming from somewhere where the floor used to be.



Now Keith comes in and sees the mess and shouts "Great, Now I'll have water damage, I'll have to unhook the dishwasher, Probably the water pump will be shot!"


I tell him to calm down, but understand his frustration. He seems to have a never ending job list of things to fix around the house, and the thought of another job which could have been avoided is the straw that breaks the camels back.



"HEIDI!!!!!!!! Did you put regular dish soap in here?"


"I didn't know it would do that"


"Well, Didn't it dawn on you that there may be a reason why we have the two different kinds of soap?"


Mean while I am trying to intersperse in her defence,


"She didn't know this would happen. Calm down. It's not as though she did it on purpose."


So she goes off down the hall in tears. Crying and slams her door. Typical teenage girl reaction. I got her to come out.


"Help me clean up the mess and never mind your dad, He will calm down."



We used plates to scoop the foam up into the sink, with the water running to dissolve the bubbles. After several minutes of 'plating' through what looked like fluffy clouds in Heaven, I finally cleared my way through to HELL. Once I found the bottom dish rack, I pulled it out and put it on the floor behind me in order to scoop out as much of the soapy water as I could with a beaker. Once I got as much of it down the sink as I could, I stepped back to reassess the situation.
As I stepped back, I slipped in the water which had now drained off the bottom dish rack. Suddenly, I was in one of those slapstick, Three Stooges type balancing act. All my weight (and there's a fair bit of it) was trying to go over backwards. Gravity beckoned at me. Balanced on one foot, my back arched, my arms flung out and started doing huge whooping circles. I must have looked like an ostrich in heat as I flailed to keep from falling onto the butcher knife which I thought was sticking up from the utensil rack. My life flashed before my eyes as I was sure the knife would impale me between the shoulders. The thought flashed through my mind, "How many times have I told those kids ? Knives go blade down, handle up" "If I live through this, Heidi is in big trouble!!!" Somehow, miraculously, I managed to fling myself forward and flopped across the kitchen counter. You would think I would have been relieved. Safe at last. Suddenly a strangled scream came to my ears. What the heck was that noise ? I became aware of a stabbing pain wracking my right shoulder and everything started to go black. The caterwaul I heard, was coming out of my own mouth. AHHHHHHAAHHHHHHH !!!!! For weeks, I have been having trouble with the rotator cup in my shoulder. Now there was no denying there is definitely a problem there. After a few minutes of deep breathing. The spots stopped swirling in front of my eyes and the pain subsided. The first thing I saw when my vision returned, was Heidi, wide eyed and pale. Thank God I hadn't fallen onto that butcher knife, or she might never have forgiven herself for causing her mothers untimely demise.

I recovered enough to continue cleaning up. The first thing I did was to reach around for that damned knife. It turns out that what I'd thought was a knife from the corner of my eye, was a wooden spoon.

So I survived, to live to blog another day.

We still havent seen the cat, I wonder if I flushed it down the sink with all those bubbles? Hmmm?

I guess I will think about caving and actually making an appointment for this blasted shoulder of mine. It feels okay now. But I only have to move it the wrong way, or turn over on it in my sleep, and it will be triggering a Post Traumatic Stress Disorder reaction. Every little twinge will cause flashbacks of today's near death experience.