With tropical storm Hanna making it’s way up the east coast we decided to head home from vacation one day earlier than expected. We packed up our belongings just before midnight, woke to the sounds of the storm just before dawn, and began the drive home to Maryland first thing this morning. I usually hate to leave the beach, but the storm seemed to make our departure a little easier to swallow. After two weeks of playing in the sand and surf I was ready to return home to the real world.
When we arrived back in Maryland I found our eleven year old pet sitter playing with our cats. She provided a detailed account of where they slept, hid and ate. We paid her $10 a day to feed the cats, fill their water bowl and clean their litter. At first I thought that seemed like a lot of money for an eleven year old, but it turns out that she came down twice a day to watch over the cats and played with them for quite a bit of time at each visit. She adores our animals and for her age I think she takes incredible care of them. She writes us a note at the end of the week to let us know how the cats are doing and whether or not they are happy. It is unbelievably cute.
After the sitter left my husband popped up from downstairs to let me know that a circuit breaker in the basement tripped. He installed a new air conditioner in the basement before he left for vacation, and although I told him not to leave it running while we were gone, he let it run anyway. We believe it must have overloaded the circuit. A chest freezer and small refrigerator also run on that circuit. Needless to say two to three months of chicken, steak, and ham spoiled.
I unpacked the remainder of the items brought in from the car while he cleaned out the freezer. I sorted through the mail and came across a wad of coupons and freebies from a variety of sources. We scurried off to the grocery store to pick up sour cream, chicken, and a few other odds and ends for the week ahead. We cooked tacos for dinner and after my husband ran out to an event I spent forty minutes clipping and sorting coupons.
Although I always love the beach I must admit that it feels very good to be back home.