How NOT to Be a Good House Guest

This past weekend Wes and I traveled to Carbondale, Co. (outside Aspen) to visit friends and go skiing on a new and different mountainside. We've stayed with John and Jessica before and they let us bring our pups with us which is super convenient and their pups get along well with ours so they play constantly, but this time Kris and Terrin were also coming so it was a full house. They are lucky enough to be renting an amazing place while they're on site so there was plenty of room for all of us. I like to think that Wes and I are pretty low key guest and we always pick up after ourselves and try to be almost invisible leaving the place exactly, if not better than how we found it. This trip, however was not that case.

We both took off Friday because it's an 8 hour drive to their house. By the time we got into town they were still skiing so we unloaded our car and set up Kahlua's kennel to put her in but left Duke out cause he's 11 and awesome so no need to worry about him. Wrong. We went to grab some dog food from Petco cause it's like $20 cheaper than any dog food here in Jackson. By the time we got back, Duke decided he wanted to throw up his breakfast (from 10 hours before) all over their carpet. So Wes cleaned it up. To add to it, their dog Gracie decided she wanted Wes to pick up after her too. So she took a crap next to the throw up pile. It all came up easy, but believe it or not that wasn't the biggest thing to happened this weekend.

Wes, deciding to ignore all my previous warnings since the day we met, as well as the completely empty trashcan with trash bag next to the toilet, flushed the paper towels he used DOWN THE TOILET! He used like half a roll of paper towels and thought because he flushed only 3-4 at a time that he was ok. Once again- WRONG.

Neither one of us knew anything was wrong until the next morning. I went to use the bathroom and realized it wouldn't flush so I told Wes. They were leaving early to go skiing so he quickly began to plunge it. After working on it a while he came and told me, a half asleep girl, that he couldn't fix it but would work on it later. When I got up an hour or so later to take a shower and go out with the girls I noticed that not only was it not even remotely fixed, but Wes left the plunger in the toilet and the water had somewhat overflowed. Afraid to try to flush it I disgustingly scooped out water and put in the tub to drain and cleaned up the overflow. I then took a shower and noticed that the water in the tub didn't drain well either but didn't think much of it. I just showered fast and went on.

Jessica, Terrin and I went to Aspen for the day while the boys skied and I didn't tell either of them because I didn't think anything of it cause the water wasn't still running or anything and I didn't want to embarrass Wes. Plus, what was the worst that could happen. I figured he'd just have to snake the drain later and all would be well. Again--WRONG.

We got back to the house around 6pm to find that not only had the toilet overflowed, but it flooded the bathroom (which is a Jack & Jill style) leaking into both adjoining bedrooms and down through the speakers in the main floor into the master bedroom. It was a steady flow of water leaking downstairs. Immediately, I called Wes to get his ass home NOW!

When the boys finally got there, we had the water turned off and already used every towel in the joint to try to soak up water. Wes got on a ladder and took the speaker out of the ceiling releasing tons of water. There was over 1/4th inch of water sitting on the ceiling dry wall on top of all the other water that was already soaking the two floors. The boys (a little drunk from skiing and drinking all day) sprung into action. Thank GOD they work in the business. John was able to get his drywall guy to leave the bar and come check everything out. Oh i guess I forgot to mention this was St. Patty's day night. So Wes and John ran to get shop vacs and things from the job site and Terrin and I went to the grocery store to rent a rug doctor to try to soak up the water.

By the time the boys got back Kris had already used the rug doctor to get up over 4 gallons of water out of the carpet. Wes took the baseboard off and took back the carpet, we set up heaters and fans and opened all the windows just trying to dry it all out. John snaked the tub, finding all types of nasty thing (except paper towels) and again plunged the toilet and finally got it to flush and move the water along. What had happened is that the clog of paper towels created so much pressure that water from all three floors of the house came up through the wax ring on the toilet. So my shower, Terrin's shower, Jessica's shower, anyone's restroom trips, etc. was now breaking through the seal on the toilet and flooding the place.

Happy St. Patrick's day! After skiing and shopping all day, our plan was to clean up and go out to celebrate, instead we're on our hands and knees cleaning up pee and bath water. Thanks Wes. Now John and Jessica have to deal with the inconvenience of having their ceiling ripped out and re-drywalled. At least it won't cost them anything thanks to the business their in, but it's still a mess that no one wants to deal with. I seriously doubt their speaker will work again. We made it super clear (I hope) to send us the bill for anything out of pocket.

So that was it you'd think. Wrong. Of course Kahlua needs attention too. So this morning she decided to get in on the action. After playing with Jolie all morning she decided to take a break by walking right up to Kris and throwing up on his shoe and leg. What in the world. Our dogs do not do this. When we left around 1 today, I'm sure everyone was ready for it. Who knows what else could have happened if we stayed any longer. I've never been so embarrassed and pissed (at Wes)and completely helpless. Yeah, we can't control when our pups get upset stomachs but we are adults and can control what goes into the toilet. It was a nightmare.

So, who's ready for us to come and visit? After all-


If it's gonna happen sometime...
      Then why not now?