Columnist Susan Snyder: A different kind of homesick

Monday, Jan. 26, 2004 | 8:08 a.m.

I spent last week in a foreign place.

Home.

Mine.

Circumstances involving a ruptured disk (not mine) and surgery (again, not mine) dictated that I join the ranks of the estimated 40 million Americans who "work from home."

Theoretically this arrangement allowed me to continue earning a living while preventing clean laundry, food preparation and basic daily maintenance of our household from ceasing to exist for six weeks.

Those jobs are typically monitored by the one who is now confined to a La-Z-Boy recliner until Feb. 20. (That's 23 days and about 10 hours from now.)

First of all, people who "work from home" are not happy. They do not sit around in their jammies sipping coffee until 11 a.m. Nor do they manage to accomplish anything that does not somehow create more work.

For example, by 8 a.m. Tuesday I not only had set up my interview schedule and folded a load of laundry, I had loaded the Crock-Pot with the evening's dinner and unloaded the dishwasher.

I also had disassembled and reassembled the garbage disposal. I will admit this was done while wearing jammies (necessitating more laundry and mopping of the cabinet underneath the sink).

It's amazing what the adult human can learn in a week.

Why, until Tuesday I had no idea that the pipe under the kitchen sink is actually three pipes, all held together with these handy little screw-type rings. Rings that pop right off when the water behind them has built up enough pressure.

Lesson 1: Never put your head under the sink while unscrewing said rings.

Lesson 2: The garbage pick-up people come Mondays and Thursdays, but only pick up the recycling bins every other Thursday, meaning you have to learn by Wednesday night that one of your neighbors knows which Thursday is which so you can cart all your stuff out there.

(Go ahead. Read it again. I had to.)

Lesson 3: The garage door opener will quit working properly the moment the one who knows how to fix it is incapacitated.

Lesson 4: A hammer is not the proper tool for fixing a garage door opener.

Lesson 5: Swearing doesn't do it either.

Lesson 6: Indoor plants have watering schedules that rival the after-school activity schedule of a family with five children.

It's not that I am typically idle around the house. I cook. He cleans up. I do decorating projects. He cleans up. I feed the cat.

He ... well, you get the idea.

He is responsible for anything growing in pots or outside. I am responsible for anything growing inside the refrigerator.

However, I now am responsible for anything that weighs more than a gallon of milk, sits above or below waist level or requires sitting, bending or twisting.

About the only tasks that don't fall into those categories are punching buttons on the remote and answering the telephone.

Still, it is a temporary situation, and I'll soon be back to the desk job.

Thankfully.

I need the rest.