Picture This:

You're on a main road at 11pm and you happen to glance at one of the little houses set back from the road. It's devoid of Christmas lights, but there is a scraggly looking thing on the porch that maybe could serve to add some holiday cheer to the place. You turn the other way to glimpse the house across the street that is aglow with festive warmth, but then your neck snaps back in the direction of the little house again because you see something of note. What caused the double-take? Why it's the naked toosh of a skinny little thing, no more than three years old, with his pants at his ankles. And there is a similar looking man (with pants) standing in the same position next to the boy. "Must be some kind of strange punishment?" you question aloud with your eyebrows raised.

Please don't call social services just yet; hear me out. We live on a tiny strip of the road that is between the town water lines in one direction and the town water lines going in the opposite direction. Thus, we have well water. This is ok, Zach and I were both raised on well water, and to hear that familiar hum, ahem, jarring roar of the water pump, well that just takes us back to childhood. But we also have a sucky pump and/or system, I don't really know the details, I'm just the woman of the house who often gets left in the dark about these 'manly' concerns. But I won't get started on that. So, for as long as we have lived here, we've had to budget our water. We sometimes run out of water...again, not clear on how that is possible when the water table in the ground is clearly a-ok. All I know is you turn on the tap and nothing happens. Showers are ok, but we can't really take back-to-back showers. Laundry can be done on a one-load/day schedule. I'm usually able to use the dishwasher a couple times a week as needed, but only overnight when we aren't using any other water, and only if laundry hasn't been done in the last few hours.

This is all ok with me. I don't really complain about it, I just like pointing out a lot that we don't take our water for granted. And I don't think anyone should. There are a lot of things I do simply because I don't ever want to take any form of technology for granted, or the fact that I have use of all the parts of my body needed to operate said technology. I try to use the manual doors when entering a building instead of their automatic neighbors just a couple feet away. The same goes for stairs vs. elevators. If I must take an escalator I feel awful silly just standing there being carried to the top like the Jetsons. Even though it means you look like you're going at hyper-speed, I prefer to walk the moving stairs just because that feels more natural to me. You see, I don't want to just get something for nothing. I don't know what my point is - do I like to make a show of it to make the other people feel lazy? Not sure, but I do think I like to make a statement, like maybe someone will see me reaching for the handle of the door and will think to themselves, "Oh yeah, I forgot about those kind of doors." I also feel it's like exercising a muscle - this has a lot to do with me being paranoid that someday there will be a total collapse of all computer systems (I don't care what you say Pegeen, it could happen) - sort of like how kids today don't even know how to add in their heads because we've got calculators for that. Or the fact that when my 6 year-old nephew was accidentally left home alone last year, he didn't know how to call for help because the cordless phone was missing and he'd never needed to use the rotary phone before so he simply couldn't figure it out. Or how about everytime I take a picture, all the two and three year-olds rush around to look over my shoulder, shouting that they 'wanna see'. "It's not digital," I try to explain to their blank faces.

I like being old-fashioned, and that is why I am having a little too much fun living in the 19th century for just one night. How did we skip back in time over 100 years? Well, our water pump finally crapped out on Friday (just part of the day that I am hoping Zach lets me write about tomorrow). Lucky for us, the exact people we need for this job have already been frequenting our house on a daily basis. For the course of the weekend we could use the water, but only in small amounts (think two inch bath for Jacob), and we would have to run down to the basement to turn the pump and water line back on, then turning them off again when we were done using the water. All the larger water needs (showers, laundry) have been attended to at my mom's house. Today the hole was dug out and work began on the new pipes/water system. The water's been off since this morning, and we don't know when we'll be able to use it again, hopefully tomorrow at some point. So we've got all kinds of jugs of water that were procured from other peoples' homes and we're making do with that.

To answer your question, yes, Jacob was peeing on our side lawn, and Zach would kill me if I told you he was doing the same. So I won't tell you. I was hoping to have a picture (back view only) of the side-by-side action, but my husband quickly nixed that idea. So, instead of a picture, these thousand words will have to do!