I'll write til I run out of tea.
After coming home from the honeymoon, we found we'd missed an unusual freeze, thank goodness. Our landlord made sure our water pipes didn't freeze while we were gone, so that was good. The house smelled mildly of skunk, though, and I hoped he noticed since he had told me skunks don't live here. The next day we had a worse problem. One end of the house smelled badly of sewer gas, and I was concerned that the freeze had done something to the septic system, though since I don't know a single thing about septic, I wasn't sure what. I asked our landlord if this was normal or not, and of course he said this had never happened before and then went on to suggest that it was simply house-a-tosis, i.e. this is what my house smells like all the time and I was just now noticing it after returning from a 3-week vacation. In the morning, he called me to see if he could come over and smell it for himself, and by then it had dissipated to the point of being almost unnoticeable, so I just told him I assumed it was something "normal" due to the freeze and/or our vacancy and it seemed to be going away.
Since then, it has reappeared a couple of times, only on the other side of the house. It's mild, and doesn't last long now, like only a few minutes before it is gone. I can control it a bit with open windows. DH says he can't smell it at all, so I hesitate to have the landlord come over until DH can at least smell it too. I've traced the smell to behind a shower wall, up high, not where the drain is (which I spent a day cleaning to death until I realized the smell was not coming from the drain). I don't know what to think. Normally I would blame something behind the shower wall, but I'm not sure it's as simple as that since it began so strongly on the other side of the house. A Google search tells me this is an unfortunately common and vexing problem, with many possible sources. Until it bothers DH as well, I am blamed for being pregnant and having a super sense of smell. I am relieved that it does seem to be going away on its own, because for the few days it was very bad I felt I was going crazy.
We had a very nice Christmas at home. When we got home we found we had been mailed a few wedding gifts, and we saved them to open on Christmas day since we had otherwise cancelled the gift-giving this year. My friends may expect Valentines gifts instead, I think.
For New Years Eve/Day, we accepted an invitation from one of DH's friends to come skiing at Mount Hood. He rents 1/16th of a cabin on the mountain, and we were allowed to spend the night as his guests. It was crowded, most of the other tenants were there too. Even though Mount Hood is so close to us, we had not yet visited, so it was really nice to go with someone who could act as tour guide for us.
Here is where they went skiing and I watched. DH is front and center, wearing the orange jacket.
Going up the mountain. They are in the center. DH with skis and his friend is sitting on the right with the snowboard.
And, coming down the mountain. DH is on the left, see his orange jacket? It was not very crowded, as you can see. Got a little busier within the next hour or so, but not bad at all.
Out of tea, will post more updates tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment