“The Legend of the Gil Curse” or “ The Luck o’ the Gil’s”

Well, I’m not really going to tell you a story, I’m tired. However, I am going to give you a bit of a background story. My dear dear cousins of a similar Gil persuasion often refer to “the Gil luck” or “the Gil curse.” I tend to roll my eyes when things are being blamed on such a silly notion because I find that we Gil’s as a whole are pretty fortunate people. We are not rich, and things don’t come easy, but we have a huge loving family that actually gets along, for the most part. Today, however, I have come to believe that there is some truth in the “the Gil curse.”

Sunday, we received a call telling us that a new Carpet was being installed in our apartment to be. Great thing, right? Well. Yes, but, we were told we could not move in until Friday and we were scheduled to move in on Wednesday.  Our moving truck was already reserved to be picked up on Tuesday and dropped off on Friday. So, we called the apartment manager back and told her about our predicament. They were so very sweet and accommodating. She told us we would be priority and they would do our apartment first and we could definitely move our furniture in by Wednesday evening. Problem resolved.

Tuesday, bright and early, Budget regrets to inform us that they do not have the truck we reserved at the location. So, they told us they would hunt down a truck and would call us back when they procured one.  I had arranged a couple of friends to help with the moving of heavy objects during that morning as they were going to be busy that evening.  Not to mention, it’s ridiculously hot in Monroe and the humidity takes your breath away. So we sat around and waited. I was feeling ill since I woke up so I took a nap. Four hours later, at the hottest part of the day, Budget finds us a truck. We ordered a 14 foot, they only had a 22 available. Thankfully we did not have to pay extra, as it was their fault. This put us way behind schedule, and the heat was pure misery. I also was only able to find one of my helpers. I could go on about how much things sucked but it is not interesting. The point is that between these events and me getting dizzy and feeling like I was gonna puke, we were very much behind schedule.

Next problem was being behind schedule. Truck not completely loaded till Wednesday. Linsy & Madonna are in San Antonio, their belongings are still in Monroe. Let’s just go ahead and skip to today.

Our belongings surfaced around 1pm. Our carpet was done, there were only a few minor repairs left and a few wet patches of paint on the walls. So as we are about to begin unloading our belongings, the maintenance man walks in to check on our water. He goes into my room (I have a sink/vanity) and a few minutes later he hurriedly walks out declaring that we have a really big problem. I gingerly walk to my room thinking, maybe my water is not working and deciding that it would not be the end of the world. Unfortunately, I find the exact opposite. Water is spewing from the pipe under the cabinet directly onto my new carpet. He has to leave the building to turn the main water supply off. The water finally stops pouring out, 6 gallons later. Now,  ¾ of my room’s carpet is completely saturated with water.
We are also losing the space of a whole bedroom and closet. Our apartment now looks like a sardine can. All of our stuff is piled into Linsy’s bedroom and the living room. It is awful. The carpet cleaner came and got rid of the water, and cleaned the carpet, but he had to remove the under padding (I don’t know what it’s called). So, now we not only have to wait for maintenance to fix the little odd jobs around the apartment, we also have to wait for them to redo the entire carpet in my room. We were originally being allowed to move in tomorrow after 4pm. We have no clue when we can get in there now. Maybe Saturday......I sure do hope so.

So, I am beginning to believe in this “Gil luck.” I can not, however, fully endorse it. Behind every problem I listed was a silver lining. The most striking one being: If we were not behind schedule, my stuff would have been moved in my room on Wednesday. The problem with the pipe would have been discovered today and all of my belongings would have been ruined. Another silver lining: I have an awesome friend who opened up his home to us until we can move into our own. Lastly, the management and staff at our complex are so very kind and caring. I think everything is going to turn out fine. It’s just going to take longer than anticipated.