AUTUMN... now the changes (Part 143w)

AUTUMN... now the changes (Part 143w)

On the way to Moira’s ”B“ outlined his idea for the party. He wanted to get a stripper because Martin was so ‘straight laced’ and he thought it’d really be funny watching him react. But there was a local law that prohibited strippers any place where food was served. One of the people I knew had managed to get around it by having a belly dancer and I’d told ”B“ about it a while back.  So he wanted me to follow up on it for him. He also wanted me to find a venue for the party. The problem I had with it was that although I got to know Martin when “B” had his race car and then when he started dating Sabrina, the neighbor, I wasn’t all that close to him. If Martin didn’t appreciate the idea I didn’t want to be saddled with being the organizer. I told “B” I'd do some“digging” and get back to him. By then we were back to Moira’s house.

I picked out the dresser body I wanted and located the drawers that went with it. There was room in the back of my station wagon for it so loaded it in and was ready to leave. Moira called me back and into the house before I could pull away. I pretty much knew it was to thank me and hoped she didn’t make a big thing of it. She wanted to say that she felt she owed me more than words for the help and caring I’d shown her. I know what you’re thinking and, no, it wasn’t that at all. In retrospect, it was because she was raised ‘old school’, by immigrant parents who took pride in doing things for themselves and passed that on to their kids. I didn’t know what to say and probably mumbled some inane words just to escape. When I did I knew I hadn’t heard the last of it.

The new (to us) dresser didn’t completely placate Elle for my lack of communication with her. (Where were cell phones when I really needed them?) However, Anne was excited which took some of the ‘heat’ off. I have no notes for or recollections about the rest of the weekend so it’s on to the following week.

Arriving at work I was distressed to see about seven or eight employees standing outside waiting to be let in. Walking up to the door Mike was no where to be seen. Having my own key I let them in and asked Trish to monitor the door while I went to find Mike. Elena, the mortgage teller, told me he was in the ladies bathroom. That was the one over by the drive-up window. Making the turn into the hall to get there I could see Mike with a mop and a pail. I asked what happened and he pointed to the ceiling. The water pipes for the bathroom right above us were ran up the wall and through a  small conduit like opening and water was coming through it. I was a bit upset that he hadn’t gone to find the source of the water as I made my way up the back stairs to the bathroom just outside the Board room. Originally put in for the Board members it became the ladies room when the full second floor was added. As soon as I entered I could see water spraying from the plumbing connection attached to the toilet tank. I tried to turn the valve to shut off the water supply but couldn’t even budge it. Surveying the situation I determined that pails wouldn’t be the solution and that only cutting off the source of the water would suffice. I hoped there might have been a valve back on the first floor but there wasn’t.

The plumber the bank used happened to be one of Bret’s neighbors so I tasked him with the job of getting in touch with him. A cell phone would’ve been helpful but we were fifteen to twenty years from that. I was able to round up some rags that we used to help take up some of the water until he arrived. About a half hour later he arrived and within minutes the flow was stemmed. He didn’t take long to find the cause of the leak but the first problem was going to be in finding a replacement for the faulty part. The second was that with the water turned off the bank was down to but two bathrooms... one was the public one and the other was the one the men used and was located right next to Hobie and my desks.

With 25 females between the two floors it ended up being almost a steady stream of them, coming and going, all morning but we managed. When I returned from lunch I was greeted at the gate by Bret. There was now an additional problem... Jacqui, one of the tellers, had had an ‘accident’ returning from her lunch. It wasn’t a wet one but the other kind. I knew that she had some digestive problems because, over a period of time, she’d been out because of the condition. Luckily, up to then, it hadn’t affected her at work. Trish was trying to be the ‘go between’ and was trying to help as best she could in getting Jacqui cleaned up enough to go home.

The bathroom was really only big enough for one person. Since it was the men’s room there wasn’t much in there to help her with her plight... a bar of soap, toilet paper and paper towels. As soon as I heard about the situation I went to the petty cash and got $10, gave it to Trish and told her to go next door to the W.T. Grant store to buy a wash cloth and towel for her to use. She was just about to go out the gate when it came to me that Jacqui would also need panties if the situation was a dire as I’d been led to believe. I tried to be as casual about the last part as I could until I reminded her about size. Up to then Trish had been pretty serious but that brought a smile to her face. As she disappeared from sight I could feel that my cheeks were flushed.

As much of a ‘panty man’ as I was (and am) there were limits as to just how far I’d go to get my hands on a pair that a female had worn. This was one of those times. I didn’t even want to go in the room to sneak a peek in the waste basket after she'd vacated it. Mike got the dubious duty of emptying the trash can and there was still a lingering smell an hour after she’d left. While all this was going on we were down to just one working toilet. I had visions of a few wet ‘accidents’ but if there were any I never found out about them. Even though the plumber was able to jury rig a fitting to the toilet tank just about the time the bank was closing for the day it was still a relief to a lot of employees, me included.

To be continued...