A turning point in any move is when you refer to your new home as "home." Or when you are driving from the airport to your house after a long trip and you are actually excited to be back in the place of your current permanent address.
I can remember the exact moment when I referred to Wichita Falls, Texas, as "home" and the same goes for Yuma, Arizona. Today, it takes less of an adjustment for Benny and I to start calling a new place home.
Yesterday we arrived safely back in Okinawa. The flight went smoothly. We had no problems at customs and immigration. And when we called the long-term airport parking company to notify them of our arrival, they delivered Favre at Naha International Airport in five minutes.
When they parked Favre, I was struck by how this car looks tiny compared to our compact rental cars in the States. There was one other thing that stuck me: the donut tire was in place of the passenger's side front tire.
Apparently the guys at the long-term parking heard an air leak from the tire and tried to call Benny about replacing it. But Benny already turned off his Japanese cell phone at that point and since it doesn't work in the United States, we returned home to another flat tire.
We stopped at the first service station we saw and explained the situation. The mechanic looked for a leak, but can't find one. So we paid him 525 yen to put the regular tire back on the car. That was easy.
After stopping for lunch on base (since we don't have any food in our house) we finally get home. Besides being super hot in the duplex (Benny turned off the air conditioning right before we left), I notice a wine cork in the entry way. How the heck did a wine cork did in the entry way? Strange.
Then I notice a semi-dried puddle of liquid in the back corner of the dining room, covering a two-foot radius from the wine rack. My eyes follow the spill and see an empty bottle of Catina Gigi Rosso sitting in the bottom row of the rack.
Apparently the cork popped off this bottle of wine and it leaked all over the hardwood floor. Nice. Welcome home.
I've cleaned the area twice with my Swifter spray for hardwood floors, but the area is still super sticky. I'm beginning to think this could be a permanent sticky island in our dining room. I'm considering buying a rug to throw over it and deal with the ramifications when we move out in two years and nine months.
This morning I started researching ways to clean spilled wine on hardwood floors. I'm haunted by this repeated statement: "be sure to attend to any spills immediately."
I have no idea when in the course of our three-week vacation the spill occurred. But I did attend to the spill immediately, after noticing it was there. I should get points for that, right?
6 comments:
I would try to find out what Martha would do. She knows everything.
Welcome home!
I'm so glad you're back.....I've been missing your posts. Now you get to update us all on your three weeks back here. Wish I could have met up with you!
Now the wine, good luck with that. I'm all for the rug - that's what I'd do anyway. I don't like cleaning floors.
michelle, try the hottest water you can without warping the floor. or try "soaking" the floor with hot rags. Get some old towels, throw them in the sink and turn on the hot water. Then put them down on the stain for about three minutes. Remove. If the goo mess seems like it's coming up, repeat process. Haven't tried this on wine, but my mom tried it on a jar of honey that did something similar when we went to florida.
Amy, I'm going to try your advice this weekend.
I could have told you that drinking would one day get you into trouble...
Oh, I forgot to ask about Favre...Despite the slow leak and otherwise deflated and diminished appearance he presented to you upon your return, did he give any indication where he'd like to be garaged this fall/winter? I hear rumblings that he might end up in Tampa Bay. You know, Tampa Bay, Florida, where all the old, washed up people go.
Go Broncos!
Go Vikings (for Benny's sake)
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