and The Along Came a Spider

Liz Says: I was going to talk about the taxi driver from Zaire that conducted traffic with his first two fingers and willed cars out of his way. He chided us for not having been taught french in school but he knew no english, either.
But then, along came a spider, who sat down beside her and poor little Liz and Dick we sent fleeing from their apartment.
Our current rental belongs to an Aussie who rents it out on the internet. He says its his home in Paris. It is a nice place, very small which we have come to learn is not at all unusual here. The bathroom has a shower with no tub, the floor of the shower is a 2 inch or so deep shower pan. About 3 days ago, I took a shower and noticed that the water was no going down the drain but was running to the middle of the tiny bathroom to the second drain, which keeps the place from flooding. That drain is pretty much in front of the toilet. Kinda yucky for a budding germaphobe like myself. But, I could deal with the drain, even though I wondered what could come up it, if, every time I was sitting in front of it.
So, I pulled on the drain thingy and found a great clog of hair. I called for Dick to do his manly duties and do away with the foulness. I worked on trying to keep the idea of whose hair it was and how many showers it took to accumulate. Okay, Liz really, its not that big of a deal. But, I couldn’t take another shower after that, thinking how foul the water in the pan had been.
Every time I went to the bathroom I would check the progress of the water. It did not go down, it kept bubbling, gurgling up. After a hard day window shopping for potential bed and kitchen options, I sat down noticed the shower pan was full. Okay then, Dick, this has reached a dangerous point. One more drop and the bathroom would become the second Seine.
Dick had fun with the plumber who kept saying “Douche no, la douche no.” My french is still very limited but I knew one thing. No showers.
But, of course, it was more than that. No water.
The plumber had dismantled the pump under the sink that was used in some bizarre system to keep the water down, yes, down. It is broken and will cost about 2,000 euros to fix.
So, while Dick explains that we are only renters, I run across the street to the hotel and book the last tiny room.
Dick has to go out to an ATM with the plumber to pay him for the trip charge.
So here we are in the goldenrod and mauvey heather room with terra cotta trim. The hotel is lovely from the outside and they have been very helpful and generous to us, I just cannot stand the color scheme.
The room is much warmer than the apartment, it has some sort of central heating with radiators and it is odd to have to get used to being more comfortable. The bathroom is also warm, the only heat in the apartment bathroom is the towel rack. The skylight in a shaft in the apartment bathroom also makes it a tad chilly.
The only english TV is the hell on earth channels, CNN and the BBC News.
Too much horror to bear, but yet they play it over and over adding new bits of real information every few hours.
But back to my tiny problems. The Aussie called this morning asking to speak to Dick. He promised to make things right on Monday.