Don't Tell My House, My Broken, Broken House.

I can't look, either.

I was going to post pictures today of the finished lower level.

That's right. I had intended to post those, because- finally- the downstairs rooms, bathroom, and laundry room were one thousand and two percent completed.

However.

Being as today is the six week anniversary of the day that the sewer pipe collapsed/the bottom half of the house got torn down to the studs, you know that this project ain't going down without a fight.

We had overcome the nearconstantjackhammering. The sticky concrete dust that caused me to scrub like Lady MacBeth. The staggering crush of people stomping through the house from 7am to 7pm; plumbers, contractors, foremen, insurance agents, dudes walking in just to use the phone- I have no idea who all of those people were.

But we persevered.

And when the initial go 'round at fixing the sewer pipe went [surprisingly] bust, we tolerated the extra weeks being tacked onto the project. Even when the upstairs [completely unrelated] bathroom went kaput, we laughed. (Sorta.) Sure, I sobbed when the washing machine exploded straight up to the newly painted ceiling, but I don't think anyone could've blamed me for that one.

Six weeks of screaming children, filthy everything, displaced possessions, and an impressively delayed manuscript failed to break me.

But the other day? When the walls were freshly painted, the baseboards neatly tacked into place, and the bathroom furnishings gleaming like a spa? When, just as the workers were about to finish up for the day, for the week, for the ever- when they cut into our security system line and caused it to go into panic mode?

I felt myself crumble just the teensiest bit.

So then the ADT guy showed up and was all like- Yep, this sure is a line that's been cut. But he fixed it. No problem.

But then he went home. And so did the workers. And the security system started to fritz out again. No one was sure what it was, but everyone agreed on one thing: the baseboards needed to be taken down again. Not a huge deal, especially since it had also been recently discovered that the cable line, also secured under its own honking baseboard, WAS ALSO FAILING TO WORK.

I am not ashamed in the least to admit that, while watching our contractor tear baseboards off of the wall again, I cried like a little girl not allowed on the ride.

The scriiiitching thwack of each panel tearing off a little of the blue Durarock underneath it, hearing each baseboard clatter onto the recently cleaned and cleared tile floor...it was all just a little too much.

I had been teased with the end. But I am a fool. For there is no end.

And when they discovered the problem, a nail through the center of the wire (of course!), I wasn't surprised.

I asked for a turn with the nail gun, but I wasn't surprised.