Part Two—for those of you following along…
About 8:30 p.m. we pull into our
designated parking spot in front of our townhouse excited to find see the house
lit up—until I saw the smoke.
The AC unit in front of the house was
smoking!
“It’s probably just dust and dirt
from being off for a while,” hubby said.
Lights flashed inside the house and
then it was dark again. The boys and I stayed in the Jeep while hubby went in
to investigate. When I decided he was
taking too long (two moments later), I hopped out and headed into the house.
Hubby shut the breaker off, and
turned it back on. The light flared
again—literally. The lights, the ones
that actually turned on, were blindingly bright. It looked like every light fixture in the
house had 200 watt bulbs in them (do they even make 200 watt bulbs?) It was
bright!
It started in the kitchen first. Pops
and sparks sounded like small explosions as the light bulbs burst, and smoke
poured out of the stove and the refrigerator. Bulbs exploded in the bathrooms.
The living room and dining room lights grew brighter.
When the smoke cleared, and
explosions stopped, the only light left working was an older dining room
chandelier. Its tiny bulbs were gleaming. Since all the popping and smoking had
stopped we thought maybe we could stay in the house with only that one light
and call the power company in the morning.
I didn’t want to drag the kids out and go searching for a place to stay.
We piddled around the house for a while
glad to have that one dining room light working. But as I stood there staring into the dining
room, I watched three bulbs smoldered and melt!
Time to go!
We turned off the main breaker,
packed the kids into the car, and headed downtown to find a hotel to stay in
for the night. By the time we arrived at
the Suburban Extended Stay hotel,
it was midnight. Aspie Teen already fell asleep in the car, but the other two
little ones were still awake!
We chose this hotel because it was
cheap and it boasted kitchen facilities, which we needed—desperately. Big mistake!
When my 20-month-old tried to make
a run for it down the sidewalk instead of heading into the room, I should have run
too. Hubby put my 13-year-old in bed, set
up the portable crib, and I got my 8-year-old settled in watching the Disney
channel. But, the place was admittedly
looking like a dump. The front lobby was
much nicer than the room.
All in our PJ’s we hopped into bed,
exhausted again. I was being so good. I was trying not to complain. Hubby was
incredible stressed and already hated the place—but I smelled urine. I checked the baby, and even the older ones;
no one had peed in their pants. I tried to push passed it since only my Aspie
super senses picked up the smell initially.
Damn Super-Senses!
I thought I could smash the pillow
over my face, or hide my head under the covers to get away from the smell. The
room scared me, but the blankets scared me more.
Did you ever leave a load of
clothes in the washer and forget about them?
If you did, you know that nasty mildew moldy rotten smell I am talking
about—that is what the blankets and pillows smelled like! My Aspie Teen would have puked if he was
awake, and thankfully for him, the smells do not wake him up like they do me.
Now for those of us who are
notorious for doing a load of laundry, getting distracted, and remembering the
next day that we forgot to dry the load—the solution is simple. Re-wash the darn clothes! The bedding in this hotel smelled like they
forgot them in the washer, and then just dried them. It was baked in mildew nastiness!
Hiding in the blankets was not
going to work. So I thought I would
overload my sense and maybe try to drown out my sense of smell. (Ok, I was
tired, hadn’t had much sleep in the past few nights and was clearly not
thinking straight.)
I turned the volume up on the
Disney channel, opened my Kindle and tried to concentrate on the words and breathing
through my mouth. Bad idea; I can taste
what I smell. It is probably why I cook
by smell. I can tell what is missing and
what it will taste like just by sniffing the pot, especially if I am making
spaghetti sauce. I can usually re-create
dishes that I taste in restaurants the same way—by recalling the taste and
smell of the dish. Hubby calls it my super-powers! Not a power I wanted this
night.
My head started throbbing so I had
to pop my earplugs in—another really bad idea.
The smell intensified. I am currently researching this phenomenon: the
intensification of one sense when I nullify another.
The ear plugs were not going to
work; I took them out. I felt so bad for
Hubby. I didn’t want to complain because I knew he was exhausted. My 8-year-old
old passed out next to me, but the 20-month-old was screaming on top of his
lungs, and had been since we got there. He knew we should leave.
I desperately wanted to get up,
shower, and bath the kids in the morning with nice hot hotel water (water was
on in the smoking townhouse, but no electricity—no hot water). There was no way
I was bathing in this place.
When hubby finally put his head
down on the pillow, I knew he would be asleep in minutes. Instead, he sprung
out of bed. “We’ve got to go!”
“If you want to…we can change
hotels,” I was eager to get out of there.
Apparently, when he put his head on
the pillow he smelled the urine! He
never smells anything! He called the front desk, got a refund, and we checked
out. It was past 1 a.m.
Hubby wrestled Aspie Teen asleep
into the car, and carried the other two (now sleeping) little guys.
Back in the car, he asked me how I
was handling staying in the room. “If I
smelled it,” he said, “I know it was killing you. I couldn’t let you sleep
there.”
Later he confessed that when he
went into the bathroom, flies were coming up out of the drain in the tub. I had been too scared to venture in there,
and it is a good thing.
By 2 a.m. our eyes were blurry but
we finally hauled three sleeping kids, the portable crib, and our suitcase into
the Fairfield Inn. The room didn’t
smell, the beds were clean, and I passed out very quickly.
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