It's just one of those days

Guess what?

I was locked out of the house today. In case you're wondering, no, my wife and I didn't have a fight. Rather, the whole thing started from a pile of dirty laundry. There we were, lazing in bed on an early Sunday morning (it was just past 6 am). Adelle was already up and was actively trying to get both my wife and I involved in her games. Then, wife says that we should put in the pile of dirty clothes into the washing machine so that we'd be in time to hang them up before going to church.

Being the dutiful husband that I am, I groggily got up from the bed, went downstairs, picked up the heap of smelly clothes and proceeded to put them into the washing machine. So, I opened the door to the side of the house (that's where the washing machine is placed), stuffed the clothes into the machine and started the wash cycle. Now, at the same time I was doing all this, the door decided to close on me. But, I hardly took notice of it. Satisfied that the clothes were in the good care of the machine, I turned back to go inside and turned the door knob.

It was locked.

I turned it again, just in case the knob was stuck or something. Still, it didn't budge. No matter I thought, I'll just knock. My wife would surely hear the knocking. After all, it was still early in the day, and the whole neighbourhood was still relatively quiet.

So I knocked. No response. I knocked again, harder this time. Still no response. I knocked harder still. Again, no response. I could hear Adelle squealing in the room upstairs, but as far as my wife was concerned, there was no response. So I went to the back of the house and started knocking on the back kitchen door. I looked at the time. It was 6.20 am. After a few minutes of knocking without receiving any sort of response, I stopped and went back to the side of the house. You might be wondering why I didn't go to the front of the house and just shout out to my wife. I wished I could, but we have a grille door that blocks the side walkway that links to the front part of the house. And I didn't have the key.

So, back to the side of the house it was. I knocked again, hoping this time that my wife would hear me since it was quiet then. No luck. I overturned a big pail and sat on it, thinking. Then I saw the piping that connects to the toilets upstairs. And in front of me, leaning against the wall were several chrome-plated bars that we had wanted to use as curtain rails but never did. An idea formed in my head. I could use the bars to knock on the piping. Since the piping would amplify the sound of the knocking, my wife would surely hear it. And what better knocking sound than the SOS - three quick taps, followed by three slow taps and ending with another three quick taps. Perfect! I was quite pleased with my self for thinking of such an ingenuous idea. So, I eagerly took the bar, raised it above my head and knocked it on the piping.

Tingtingting, ting-ting-ting, tingtingting.

I did this several times. But after each time, my good spirits slowly stated deserting me. Still, there was no response.

The next hour saw me doing either one of three things: sitting, knocking on the door, or tapping the pipes with the bar. When the washing cycle was finally done, I hung out the clothes to dry. Just then, my neighbour came out of her house. I said hi, and asked if I could borrow her phone. I quickly explained my predicament but leaving out the detail that I had been stuck out there for a long time. As it is, it was already an embarassing situation for me and to give her that extra bit of detail would have forever put me in her long-term memory filed under dimwits. She laughed as she passed me the phone.

Oh well, the embarrassment was more than worth it - my wife opened the door and I was inside my house again! When I was finally inside I looked at the clock. It was 8.40 am. My entire ordeal had lasted more than two hours!

Later in the day, I asked my wife if she heard any knocking. She said she did. Then I asked her, wasn't she curious that there was this incessant knocking that was going on? Her reply - she thought that it was the neighbour's kids who were up to some mischief as they are wont to do. She said she was actually irritated because it woke Adelle up. Then I asked her again, didn't she find it odd that the knocking was in the form of an SOS. Her reply - what's that?

What a way to start the day!