If
you ever want to see years of your life pass in front of you, clean up
a flooded basement. While I was away on vacation, I got a call from my
alert tenant saying that he heard water running. While I was still on
the phone in panic mode, he informed me that water was flowing down my
back stairway into the cellar. I called my ex-wife, who has a key, and
asked her to go check it out. I also called my best friend Chuckie and
he went over and shut off the water.

This fiasco all started
with the contractor who was supposed to insulate my back hall where the
washing machine is – the pipes run up from the cellar and through the
cold back hall. Man do I wish I could print that contractor's name here
– the bum never insulated the hall or the pipes, so I ran temperature
sensitive heated coil around the pipes. The only problem is that it has
to be plugged in! The story gets stupider. See, while I was trimming my
hedges last summer, I cut through the extension cord. I then borrowed
an extension cord from my outdoor Christmas decoration box. So here
comes Christmas and I am one extension cord short, so I borrow the cord
that is plugged into my pipe warmers. Here comes the clincher. I never
replaced the pipe warmer sensor's freaking extension cord. Told you it
was stupid.

I just completed the 4 hour clean up and toss out
session. The first thing I had to do was de-ice the back stairs since I
had been away. Then I had to go through all the saturated crap that was
in the back hall and in the front section of the cellar. There was tons
of stuff in the floods path that was now cold, smelly and dripping wet.

The
first thing I attacked was a plastic kitchen barrel full of old kids
toys. In particular, Po, the red Teletubby. It was my youngest son's
favorite toy for quite some time. It broke my heart, but it was
completely saturated, so I sadly dropped him in the plastic trash bag –
farewell P. Some other items were some old cassette tapes from my Kiss
108 radio days – they too were dripping so I also tossed those in the
rubbish. A whole bag of old (very small) roller blades had been
submerged for days in the dirty flood waters, so out they went with a
sigh. Wet, but not ruined, was one of a set of three very old steam
gauges that belonged to my father. He worked at Dewey and Almy's (WR
Grace) near Alewife for 38 years. When they demolished the building, he
went down and watched. He asked the wrecking crew if he could have some
of the gauges that he had monitored for 38 years. They should never
have been in the cellar. As soon as it is dry, it will have a new home
on top of the armoire – next to the photo of dad dressed in a kilt. He
had the picture taken during a trip to Scotland while serving in World
War II.

Here is a list of some of the other items that suffered
extensive water damage – a very small hockey stick, a bag of plastic
sand sculpting molds, a small refrigerator magnet that said Christine's
Kitchen (my sister), a sign from one of my old bands, several
notebooks, a set of bicycle training wheels, a 1969 Somerville
newspaper that had a photo of me in it, and some other vintage
photographs. You can't just scoop this stuff up and plop it right in
the trash. You pick it up, look at it, and suddenly a wave of memories
washes through your head. Some are drying out and some are in a Russell
Disposal truck.

Unharmed was my mother and father's gorgeous
framed wedding certificate, complete with their signatures and Father
Properzi's from St. Anthony's Church. The glass cracked but it is in
good shape.

So, moving on to my trip – on top of the flood at my
house – the travel agency screwed up royally. The shuttle service that
was to take us from the airport to the hotel had no information in
their computer about us, so we had to pay again (we will be reimbursed).

Then,
the hotel knew nothing of our reservations. If they had been all booked
up, we would have been "you know what" out of luck. I called the
"travel agency" and they fixed it after blaming everyone but
themselves. We got two small fruit baskets from them. Wow! Then on the
way home, our flight was delayed 3 hours and we got in very late. The
airline charged for everything and the attendants were rude. We did
however have a wonderful vacation despite all the drama.

So
let's review. I can't name the idiotic contractor, the moronic travel
agency, or the worst airline I have ever flown on in my life. But right
up there with the balloon heads is me, for not replacing the heating
coil extension cord. I just finished the last of the clean-up and Joe
the Plumber (that is really his name) is coming at 8am tomorrow.

When
I told my ex-wife about having to throw Po the Teletubby out, she got
very nostalgic. She said, that was little Jimmy's favorite toy and that
Uncle Chuckie bought it for him – so I picked through the trash until I
found him and brought him in the house, still dripping. I placed him in
the tub-by on a towel. As I laid him down, he started speaking! He has
several phrases and the first one I heard was "big hug" – yes, it
scared the hell out of me. How could it have been in the cellar for
years, get totally saturated, and still talk? When I was in the shower
the doll started talking again from the corner of the bathroom floor. I
actually told it to shut up several times. It's comforting to know that
I will continue losing my mind in the new year. By 2015 I should be
completely gone.

So far 2009 has been very eventful, to say the
least. Hopefully tomorrow the plumber won't soak me, again.
You can
email Jimmy directly at jimmydel@rcn.com.