Rolling With It...

The first time I traveled internationally (excluding Canada) I went to Venezuela. This was well before Hugo Chavez (1994 to be exact); it was interesting, educational, and then at the end everything went to hell mostly because I didn't speak Spanish. As a result I got stuck in the Caracas Airport for three days, which is horrible unless you like Mariachi music (there always seemed to be a Mariachi band playing at the most surreal times). The next few times I traveled, I always seemed to have some kind of difficulty at the beginning of the trip. As a result I've developed this attitude that if something is going to go wrong (and it invariably will), it's much better to have things go wrong at the beginning. That's what I've been telling myself the last few days.

I moved up to this cabin on Saturday, and for the last few days it seems like something unexpected has gone wrong. For example, the woman who owns the cabin is a good friend and she came over for dinner on Monday night. When it comes to cooking, especially when I have guests, I'm pretty organized. I had everything prepared and ready to go, when my friend texted to say she would be coming and hour early. No big deal, I just threw stuff in the oven earlier than expected. She arrived and we were having the appetizer, the vegetables that needed to be roasted were done, dessert was in the oven, and the grill was heating up to cook the lamb chops. 

Suddenly the oven started flashing and sparking -- the heating element in the oven (it's electric) blew. No big deal really, dessert was moved to the toaster oven to finish and the stove was unplugged. I went to check on the lamb, and discovered that the grill had run out of gas... and guess what I had no refill tanks (it takes those little propane tanks). So dessert came out of the toaster oven, the toaster oven was then cranked to broil, and the chops were put in there for five minutes. Voila! Dinner was saved.

Even if the toaster oven hadn't saved the day, I subscribe to the philosophy (I think I heard Ina Garten say this once) to always keep a few extra bottles of wine on hand. That way if something happens with dinner, you can get everyone drunk. 

Sadly, something must have been a little off with dinner, because during the night both of our stomachs were bothering us. I ended up spending most of the day commuting between my bed and the bathroom. Fortunately, I got a lot of reading done.

Then yesterday my sinuses welcomed in the change of season (it snowed on Monday night as well). I don't ever recall having such a serious sinus problem. If you'd seen the way my nose was running, you would have thought it was some kind of comedy skit. Then last night my nasal passages completely closed. I tried using a sinus rinse (a disgusting but effective tool), but they were so clogged that the saline just ran right out of the same nostril (it's supposed to go in one nostril and out the other). Despite the fact I spent most of the night mouth-breathing, this morning I feel much better.

The good part is this is all happening now. I figure that if everything that can go wrong does so now, then come February life will be grand!