"Can You Pick Up a Bag of Ice?"
Those forlorn words...muttered by my husband about once every thirty-six hours...so iconic of the zeitgeist of household disrepair that someone once made it Dad's cellphone ringtone...

Now the ice issue has become part of the 'continental undrift' of my work and home lives. The identical French working glasses that I and a few other people in both locations think are absolutely swell, the identical dirty/clean sign on the dishwashers [yes - I made both of them], my boss and my husband having the same birth date... the list goes on. And now the icemaker. At work it's not for want of contacting a repair man. He's been here enough that we're becoming old friends; though not so friendly that I could ask him to hook me up with free repair service at home.

There are no dogs at work so there is some semblance of sanity. And a nice lady vacuums my office and dusts all the surfaces in the rectory on a regular basis. Except for my desk...I told her not to worry about my desk. My desk is a little too cluttered to ask anyone else to dust it. And there's that three-year old petrified potato on the shelf. Perhaps some people are put off by that. Honestly, though, the thorough ministrations of the cleaning lady leave me a little blue. I want to be the 'nice lady.' But when I get home and it is my turn, I'm not particularly nice.

I'm praying for patience. And offering up the glasses of tepid water...here and there. Accepting the way it all weaves together. [Well, just as long as I don't get a call from Fr. asking, "Can you pick up a bag of ice?" ]

UPDATE: Eureka - we have ice at work today. But that machine has lulled me into a false sense of security before, so I'm not counting on finding ice tomorrow.