I Should Start Hitting Ignore

The mobile rings and I look at the caller ID. It’s Mom. I debate pressing ignore. I should do that, but sometimes calls from her are actually important. Really quite terribly important. Not this one. Nor most of them. But sometimes…

She called to tell me that the floor in the upstairs bathroom near the tub has wood rot (which I have known and been complaining about for MONTHS) and that when my cousin was reaching in to get a piece of rotted wood that had fallen into the gap between the floor and the ceiling, he inadvertently put his hand through the dining room ceiling. It has water damage too. And the extra fridge died. The fridge dying is not water damage related; it’s just poor timing.

After asking me if I had a few minutes to spare at work, Mom started the conversation by saying, “Well, the shit has really hit the fan this time!” She was going on about how much money it will cost to fix. She was completely annoyed with me when I asked if my cousin was okay (He didn’t fall through the ceiling? He didn’t get electrocuted on the wiring inside the ceiling?) and said it wasn’t so bad then.

Had my parents listened to me almost a year ago when I brought the state of the floor and the tile to their attention or when I started complaining about it or when I took a picture of a mushroom growing between the tiles it might not be this bad. I told my dad that if a mushroom is growing in the floor that means the floor is turning into dirt! It’s what mushrooms do.

I will admit though, that I was vaguely impressed by the mushroom. Firstly, it was a very pretty color: a mix of grey and purple. Secondly, it was there. I think it must be rather difficult for mushroom spores to make it into houses, up to the second floor, into a room where they might be able to grow, and then find purchase somewhere. This was an amazing mushroom. Thirdly, that fucker was a pain in the ass to get rid of! I pulled it up at least three times, washed the floor with anti-bacterial stuff, and eventually scrubbed under the tiles with Clorox bleach wipes. I think the bleach wipes finally did it.

I haven’t see it in a while and don’t want to contemplate that the mushroom finally rejected our floor because it was no longer pleasing to fungi.

Update

I got home to find that the hole in the dining room ceiling is literally the width of my cousin's index finger. He didn't accidentally punch a hole in the ceiling. He quite purposefully put a small, barely noticeable hole in the ceiling whilst testing the amount of water damage.