I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas

well I'm not ready for the white part of Christmas as of yet, but I am in the spirit. Last year at this time our house was sitting on the foundation with no water, electricity or sewer thanks to our ass wipe county sanitarian who kept asking for changes on our septic plan and then had 90 days to approve changes made. The magic date for his decision was December 16th. Luckily we still had a house on the property we could live in while this was all going down. I spent my days at the new house cleaning and unpacking as much as I could do without benefit of water or power. During this time I had the hope that we would be able to move in by Christmas. I would sit in my frigid livingroom on my new plastic wrapped furniture and plan on where I would put the tree and how I would decorate my mantle. December 16th came with yet another denial and further requests of changes. Then once again we had to wait for his decision which he could take up to 90 days to make.

Christmas came and went. I tried to make the best of it, but it was hard to look out of the window of my little house and see my dream house sitting there dark and cold. On Dec 28th, we got power to the house! Whoohoo! I could vacuum and we could at last run the pellet stove for warmth. Hubster and I made a decision the next day that I think shocked everyone around us. We moved into our new house without running water or sewer. For the next 12 weeks we walked to the other house to shower, do laundry, do dishes and of course piss and crap. It was like an upscale camping trip with very comfortable sleeping accomodations. Since we had two houses to keep up we cancelled the satellite TV and got only 2 snowy network channels. We kept the phone service at the old house and by sitting a cordless phone by the window in the new house we could use the phone if we stood at just the right spot. I kept my computer at the old house and while doing laundry or running the dishwasher I'd surf the web and get my fix. Dean who was 2 and half at the time often disappeared from the new house and in a panic we'd find him at the old house dialed up to N1ck Jr playing with his beloved Dor@ whom he greatly missed on TV. For the first few weeks I would faithfully walk with flashlight in hand to go potty before bed or upon rising. Eventually I just went out in the woods and peed with the rest of the forest beasts. Finally with the coming of Spring and many obstacles hurdled we got our septic permit from a new sanitarian after the old one mysteriously disappeared. The new guy said there was absolutely no reason why we had to go through what we did and signed it within 3 days of taking office. The end of March we officially emptied our old house of all possesions and moved everything in to our new home.
All this past year I have looked forward to finally being able to have the Christmas I so wanted to give my boys. To finally have stockings hanging from a mantle and not on a hook on the wall. To have room for our tree without having to relocate furniture to other rooms. In the past I usually waited until the first weekend in December to put the tree up, but this year its going up Thanksgiving weekend if I can wait that long even. I just hope it lives up to visions dancing in my head.