It went about like any other divorce on the books. The painful split of everything right down the middle. This one for him and that one for me. Things you were annoyed by for years could finally go to good riddance, such as, adios to the wagon wheel.  So, naturally I wasn't thinking about who had the shovel in June. I didn't look for it until the snow started falling in November and I needed it.  I also needed to be to work and the bus was going to be leaving in no time at all. That's when I had to improvise fast. I found that if you turn a rake upside down, you can move the snow from a driveway off to the side quick enough to clear a path and get the car heading down the road.

I learned that when you replace the burned out headlight for the car that you don't remove the plastic covering from the front of the headlight, which would be the easiest way to unscrew the lightbulb and put a new one in.  On the contrary, you have to open the hood and do it from the back.  It certainly is more manly to do it that way. A girl now, she would have designed it the other way around. It was easy enough once I figured out the correct entry point.

I found that when you decide the gutters simply have to have gutter screens on, because he decided they didn't need them and tore them all off one day, that you will have to get on the ladder and do it yourself unless you want to pay someone a fortune to do a pretty simple job.  The hard part was working up the courage to get up on the ladder with my corded, not cordless, electric drill and prepare to screw in the gutter guard screens. 30 minutes later and still on the first screw, I learned that the job goes much quicker if the drill is not on reverse.  It also helped when my knees weren't shaking as much.  Chalk it up to experience.

I learned that all the previous moaning and groaning and procrastination about putting salt in the water softener is no big deal at all.  It gets poured into a giant cylinder. Based on previous person's effort, I would have thought it went in a cup at a time.  I almost called the water softener people before I attempted it because I thought they would need to instruct me.  I decided instead to ask my Mom first, who claimed she had done it before, and when we pulled off the lid, I was amazed by the simplicity of the project.  Yes, I too could add salt to the water softener.
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When the bathroom sink started leaking, I was fairly concerned. This was most likely going to require the services of a professional plumber.  Since it had been misbehaving for some time, I decided to lean on the old ex to see if he would repair a job I had asked him to do long ago.  As with most projects, he came in and stopped the damage and that is also where the work stopped.  A month later, still without a sink and imposing on my kids' bathroom, I was tired of the bedtime battles over who got to brush their teeth first.  I decided to take matters into my own hands and go buy a new bathroom vanity.  I picked it out at Ikea, loaded it into my car, carried it in the house, unpacked it and opened the manual. Immediately, I was more than a little intimated by the 26 page instruction book and I almost stopped at page 1 when I saw this cautionary drawing.

It was going to be just me after all and I am a girl to boot.  I don't have anyone to call who can put a pencil behind his ear like that.  Not one to be easily deterred, I decided to see how far I could get.  I spent 3 hours on a Saturday night and while it wasn't installed to the wall, it was assembled.  Now for the installation part of it.  This brings me back to that corded drill. I bought a pack of drill bits, but I think there's one piece that can actually, well it has a screw end like it can screw in different types of screws.  The last time I saw it was when I put the gutter guards on in August.  But now there is a foot of snow outside and I really hope I didn't leave it laying out there in the yard.  I don't think I did but then I stopped by the computer to check something and the next thing I knew I was writing this blog.
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I'll keep looking for that piece for the drill, but in the meantime, I would like to note that it hasn't even been a year and look at all the things this girl has done.  Maybe I don't need a man in my life after all. I don't know, they are pretty nice to have around I guess.  Just don't tell them I know how to do all this stuff. And if they think it's sexy to watch a girl shovel, they can apply elsewhere.