Lights & Ladders

Two days ago I had my last x-ray and dr. visit for my foot -- 2 months after my surgery date. Everything looks good and I got the doc's clearance to do what I want -- no activities excluded. So guess what I was doing yesterday afternoon.

My outside Christmas lights decided to stop working this week. They've been up for a couple of weeks, working just fine -- and then they just quit. It was about more than I could stand to concede defeat to those contrary cords. But concede I did, knowing I didn't have the doc's clearance to do any climbing yet, and having to start over with my foot's healing because of doing something dumb isn't an option.

BUT with the ladder ban officially lifted on Thursday, it was finally time! So that's how I spent Friday afternoon. Climbed the ladder, found the problem, back down the ladder, found a new cord, back up the ladder, plugged the new cord in, strung it, made sure it worked, then down the ladder. Apparently my Christmas lights are at that contrary stage in their existence. I plug them in, make sure they work, then after they're up for about 5 minutes, they stop working. This interesting little dynamic provided four rounds of this light-hanging process. But all the while I was still "plum" happy that I could be out there working on it. (eastern MT vernacular for "very" or "quite") :-)

So, as with most projects - one thing leads to another. In the middle of one of the short windows of time when the lights were all on, I found more lights. Well, if there's more lights, then they should go up! On the steepest part of the roof! So with my husband's help, I got the big dog ladder up and climbed that sucker, carefully but still happily, even though my fingers were losing feeling by this time.

They were looking so nice, all icicle-y...and then the whole lot of them went out. ugh. Felt a little frustrated, but still mostly happy and energized by the fact that I could be on a ladder, but more by the vision of the glow that would soon light up our section of the street. I would've made a good Griswold.

I had to go back to where I started and after awhile had to concede again. There wouldn't be extra lights up but I'd finished what I meant to do initially. I fixed the problem on the front side of the house and went inside quite satisfied.

Then I looked out closer to bedtime and only one strand was lit. grrr.
So today it continues. There's a nice blue sky, some snow on the ground -- can't think of anything I'd rather do on December 23 than bundle up and spend the rest of the morning on a ladder.