Who knew?

Okay, so this post is to vent a bit, share the funny realizations of our new place of residence, or to just Freak Out with all the changes and new knowledge of where we have moved. (Brad is gone again (Wed - Friday) so I am all alone, and if I talk to the kids about all these things, they might start freaking out too! :-)

So, anyway, I knew things would be different living out in the country, but wow, what an education. You see, three times this week I have been told that Jerome, ID is the armpit of ID. What does that exactly mean? Oh, and how nice to know that we now live in the armpit of the state. So, instead of getting defensive with the person telling me this, I just chalk it up to knowledge about where we now live.

And, here is what I have learned about Water. Did you know that water can be extremely hard and filled with lots of rock minerals? Did you know that Hard water leaves a lovely white powdery film on all of your dishes? Did you know if you leave a glass that has been rinsed sitting on your beautiful black sink, that you will have a decorative ring on the sink where it sat, and it does not go away for a long time. (I did learn that vingar and water will remove it, eventually). Did you know that when you shower in Hard Water that you are leaving a disgusting layer of soap scum on your sink and hair, which dries your skin out to an attractive layer of shedding, itchy skin. And, did you know that when you drink Hard Water, you are also drinking all the rock minerals that the water contains? Do you want me to go on - or are you grossed out yet?

I have tried to be patient with the Water situation - but I've had enough. And, my itchy, flaky skin and yucky hair is screaming for relief. So, we called a water softener company, called Kinetico, which came to us with high recommendations. We set a meeting with the salesman for Tuesday night - thinking that it would be a quick meeting, a high price to fix the water situation. Well, the high price is correct, but the quick meeting wasn't. We learned so much about hard water and with lots of graphic demonstrations - more than I really wanted to know about!

So, tomorrow we are going to have a $2,700.00 water softening system put in to fix the problem. Just a mere $2,700.00!!! And, we have to now be on a Salt delivery route. What is that? I've heard of Milk routes and paper routes - but Salt routes. But wait - you would think that after this huge expense, we can carry on with relief from the hard water - just as if we had it all along. No, soft water contains sodium - from the salt - so now we have to consider drinking water. A filtered system does not filter out the salt, it only filters out the minerals, so for another $1,600.00 we can have a drinking sytems installed. Come on - when does it stop. (We are not doing this at this time - we will just stay stocked on Bottled Water. And, Softened water kills plants - so inorder to water my plants (which I just bought a bunch of new ones) I have to go to the garage, switch the lines on the softener to get hard water. Sounds so complicated - I am hoping not. And, soft water leaves your hair extremely frizzy - great! Isn't this all hilarious? I only say that because if I don't I might lose it. Oh, and one more thing I learned about during this presentation was that if we lose power, we also lose water. Yikes!! This is because we are on a well, which is of course powered by a pump. At this point - I looked at Brad and said - "Where did you move me to?" So obviously I was very naive about this country living, wells, propane heat, and the lack of convenience to places and things. Next thing I know we might be hitching up the horses in the dead of winter to get groceries. HA-HA!

For all of you who know me - know that I like everything in its place, working as I think it should, and the convenience of technology and basic needs, and all things clean and germ free. You can only imagine my horrified look when I saw the "scum" in the water during the lovely presentation we were given.

Thanks for reading this venting post, and for laughing with me.