Deck the Halls, Bruise Your Hand
I spent a large portion of the day today fixing up small things around the house … adding insulation, putting some accent lights out front, decorating my Christmas tree, yada yada yada. Every time I crossed something off the list, however, two or three things were miraculously added. It was like the Fountain of Youth … except more like a Fountain of Never-ending-things-to-do.
At about midnight, it was time to call it quits, so I sat down in front of the electric drug (the TV) to wind down a little. My butt had barely hit the couch when I heard some banging out on the front porch … someone was going in and out of my tenants’ front door, over and over. Eventually I got up to see what was up … and I discovered that it had been left open, on one of the windiest nights of the year. Yeah. One tenant had come down, bewildered, and was trying to pull it shut.
A quick glance revealed that the screen door had been bent by the wind, and the inside handle had broken off from my tenant’s efforts to rein it in. Argh … and here, I suppose, is exactly the kind of situation that everyone had warned me about when I decided to become a landlord. Honestly, I’d rather have clogged toilets than broken doors … but at midnight it’s all about the same!
In denial, I just got out my screwdriver and took the door off, figuring that I could deal with it tomorrow. And as I skulked back to my bedroom to retire, my cell phone rang. It was another tenant, asking me to come to the door. At 12:40am.
I did, expecting to find a collapsed porch or car protruding through my living room window or [insert dramatic catastrophe here] … but when I opened the door, he was simply standing there with a small present and a Christmas card. How fantastic! I ran and got the gift that I had prepared for him, and we chatted a little about our Christmas plans before heading off to our respective rests.
Ok, maybe I can do this. 
December 23rd, 2007 at 4:14 am EST
Yeah…you can.