Dear Old Dad

I have the best parents in the world. They love me even though I'm crazy. Just the other day my Dad and Othermother came by to celebrate my birthday and things were going great until my A/C started making noises that sounded like a varmint scratching around. 

For some reason, my ears can pick up tiny little sounds and I'll go nuts trying to locate the source. Boy, did I go crazy. I had to find the source of the noise! It was a lot like the scene in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bEgWjrcPbws) only there wasn't a Christmas tree involved.  I looked at the air vent and thought I saw a squirrel! I saw something tan and it appeared to be standing up!

(Picture from Introvertedextrovert.blogspot.com)

I was convinced that there was a squirrel looking down at us from the vent - probably cackling with delight at the way I was going berserko. Well, I did what any crazy, insane person would do, I got a ladder and climbed right up to take a look at the critter. As it turned out, my "squirrel" was actually a piece of wood that was a support for the air duct. But the noise kept going on and on!

Leave it to Dad to save the day. He used his (calm) ears to trace the sound to another air vent where he calmly opened it up. The sound turned out to be a piece of metal air duct tape stuff which was scratching against part of the A/C unit. No killer squirrel in sight.

Now, I have to back up just a bit and admit that as dear old Dad was unscrewing the bolts holding the vent to the wall, I was horrified to notice that the thing was covered in dust and stuff. And he's a neat freak! O...M...G!!!!!

I was extremely embarrassed for him to see my gunky vents. Dad didn't even make a fuss about it - he simply asked me if I had a broom so it could be cleaned up. But nooooooooooo, I was so humiliated, what did I do? I started crying. I'm sure Dad thought I had lost my marbles - heck, I felt like I had! I tried to explain that I was upset because every time he visits my home, something is broken, or something breaks, or that I think there's a varmint in my vents and those vents are really scummy and dusty and I'm a horrible housekeeper and he's super neat and clean. Yep, I was blubbery. And stupid. And snotty.

In retrospect I think that what happened, was that something else had happened prior to my parental units' visit which had me upset and crying. When they arrived, I did my best to put on a happy face and pretend that I wasn't upset. When the squeaking started I went into a psycho crazy laughing jag at the thought of squirrels flying out of my walls, and the scene from Christmas Vacation and then Dad saw my grungy vent and my hysterical laughter turned into tears. Can anyone say "hormones???"

The rest of the visit went quite well and we had a nice visit - once the squeaking was gone. Geez I love my parents. I don't think that they judge. Too much.