Man and Wife in hot water

People say that things like infidelity, intimacy and leaving the toilet seat up will test a marriage. They’re full of it. Nothing tests a marriage like a leaky water heater. Early Saturday morning, Dave woke me with one sentence: “I think the water heater is busted.” In just seconds I was wide awake and mopping up our kitchen with the towels we got from our wedding registry. If anyone knows me, and knows me somewhat well, they know what I’m like dealing with a crisis in the middle of the night. I’m a God-awful bitch. A hopeless nag. I’m serving up guilt with a side of “I told you so.”

Now, our water heater is a sensitive subject. When we bought the house in which we live now, our Realtor, our seller’s Realtor and our home inspector all told us that we should replace the water heater before we have an emergency plumbing call in our future. I thought, “Hey, these guys know what they’re talking about. We should replace this thing before we have to get up in the middle of the night to mop up our kitchen.” Dave, however, did not share my incredible foresight. Dave is a flashy exterior kind of guy. I’m a brick-and-mortar person. When it comes to home improvements I’m more keen on taking care of the stuff that needs to be taken care of for the life of the home. Dave likes to make things look pretty. I don't have anything against pretty things, but I like those pretty things to actually make a sound structure, one that won't randomly gush water from weird places, look good.

So, we're up in a flash with mounds of damp towels trying to soak up the mess that has spilled forth from our water heater. I'm grumbling profanity and Dave is really trying quite hard to make the most of the situation. He's poking fun and making jokes and doing all that crap while I'm soaking my pajamas and socks, wading around our kitchen, trying to mop up all this friggin' water with my nice bath towels. Did I mention I was trying to mop up water with my nice bath towels? Yeah. The ones I registered for. For our wedding. Yeah, those.

So, we get things dry enough in the kitchen that Dave says to let well enough alone and go back to bed. So much for Saturday morning yoga. I didn't roll back out from under our exquisite down comforter until well after 9 a.m. and I got up then only because Dave said we had even more water on our kitchen floor than before. That's after we hooked up a garden hose, turned off the filler valve and closed off the gas. Since there was more water, we needed more towels. It was a repeat of our 3 a.m. de-messifying.

We were in quite figurative hot water. Our water heater was on its last legs. Those legs were beginning to crumple and disintigrate. We didn't know what to do. Next logical step: Call your father-in-law and bleat like a panicked goat.

Bobby, in all his cool-as-a-cucumber-ness, came to our rescue. He phoned his moonlighting plumber friend and we were set to get a new, incredibly better water heater at a fraction of the price most people pay to have one installed. I was friggin' thrilled, especially after Dave's 3 a.m. "Let's wait it out through Monday" suggestion. I'm sorry, but I'm a female with good hygeine (the opposite of Dave) and I can't wait for two days to shower. Period.

Moonlighting Plumber Guy was a real treat though. He had trouble finding the house, but when he arrived I was almost giddy. He was the definition of macho wrapped in a stereotypical asshole packaged and tied with a length of mullet-tastic-ness. Seriously, the guy had the balls for a mullet, and his truck had a set of plastic testicles hanging from the back. I don't think it gets much better than that. He did do a great job, though. He took only about 5 hours to get the water heater, fit the pipes, fit the vent and somehow fit the water heater in our incredibly small closet. Kudos, Mr. Mullet-Plumber.

Though today's grand event was supposed to be the installation of our wireless internet. It's coolness is compounded by the fact that I can now work from home on days I feel shitty. Awesome. Not only that though, but the cable guy was so sweet. THis was his first time to install a new cable connection all by his lonesome. And when everything worked properly we high-fived. There was a moment, I'm not going to deny it, when I had the Jerry Maguire You-complete-me look in his eyes. In a flash it was gone, but our insanely fast wireless internet remains. Everyone, rejoice.

So, I'll bid you folks adieu. I'm going to take a nice, hot, shower and mull over how many thousands of ways today could have gone so much worse. But it didn't.