It Could Have Been Worse

This past week I was wondering what I would blog about this Sunday.  But Friday came and gave me something to write about. 

Friday evening I was invited to dinner at another MAF family's house. ( BTW, the food was delicious!  The ladies here are such good cooks.)  Anyway - when I left the house, the electricity was off.  (Just so you know, we are currently on a one-day-on, one-day-off power outage scheule.  The power outages last about 5 - 6 hours.)  Back to the story.  When the electricity is off, usually there is no water in the house because the pump is electric.  But whoever lived here last year rigged some kind of gravity tank so that there would always be water.  This tank is in the attic right outside my bedroom door.  Too many details; you're already bored.  I'll just cut to the chase.  While I was gone, this tank started filling up but never stopped filling and yes, you guessed it - started overflowing.  I'm not sure how long it ran but when I got home water was pouring out of the ceiling and down into the basement.  It was pouring through the basement ceiling into Chad's classroom and the library.  There were about two inches of standing water on the floor of the classroom, the library and the hallway. 

I frantically called our program manager and he came to my rescue.  While I waited on him to arrive, I was dashing about like a chicken with its head cut off.  I didn't know what to do first.  I didn't have a clue how to stop the flow of water; there were so many places it was pouring out of that getting a bucket didn't even cross my mind.  I just kind of dashed hither and yon fruitlessly. 

Long story short - we got the water turned off, several people came over to help sop up the mess and by 11:30 we had most of it cleaned up. 

Now the real work begins.  Finding out why the tank ran over and what to do about it.  Thankfully, not my job. 

I didn't get any pictures because unfortunately my camera got a little bit wet.  It's fine now.  So I took a picture of the big hole that is now in my celing.  You can just see the infamous orange tank in this picture.  It is sitting on a platform which I hope is a sturdily built platform.  If that tank should ever come crashing down out of the attic - Good-bye cruel world. 

 

This is the spot where water was pouring out onto the bookshelves. 

 

 

 Water-logged books drying out in front of the fan.  

 

 

I'm just thankful it wasn't worse and that I didn't have to clean up the mess by myself. 

 

Until next Sunday!