So we have had some issues with pools. My kid loves water – LOVES water – and I was very excited for summer to arrive! Finally the temps have reached 80 degrees and we are getting a little prickly-like and opening windows and such and I thought, yes! Pool time!!

We have two pools, currently: a very small round baby pool, and a larger inflatable kid pool with inflatable slide and inflatable waterfall. It was so much inflatable awesomeness! I couldn’t wait! We were going to go swimming!

Except… I had to blow it up. No big, right? Except when I took it out of the box and unfolded it I said holy shit, how big IS this thing? Then I looked at the box closer and my mom did math in her head (something that apparently skipped a generation). “6 feet? No 7 feet.” I stared at the thing and realized that, no, I was not going to blow this thing up myself. I called my husband and asked about a pump. Now apparently there was a mis-communication, him thinking I was asking about a bicycle pump, me thinking he meant a manual pump like a bicycle pump. Turns out that is a very important distinction. We drove all the way to walmart to buy a pump only to later have Den tell me that we already had an electric pump for inflatables, just not for bicycles. (Side note: Why the hell would I need a bicycle pump to inflate a pool?)

Regardless, we finally got back from Walmart with an awesome little pump and I started to try to inflate it. It wouldn’t inflate. Visual inspection revealed that was because the air was escaping out through a large round hole input thing… you know, the kind that are designed so that you can inflate it with a vacuum cleaner. Which we have. Making the Walmart trip doubly unnecessary. I was thrilled.

We’ll skip through the part about how I inflated it inside with the vacuum, then tried to maneuver it out the back door…. to the part where I positioned it in our back yard and filled it with water…. through the water hose which only works from our front yard spout. (The back yard’s broke.) So it filled up and I realized, holy cow, this thing takes a lot more water than I thought.

But finally! Finally it had water in it! Not a lot, just a few inches, but enough. I found a bathing suit and got into it. (Black? Possibly not as slimming as I once thought. I have lost weight, I mistakenly thought this would mean I wouldn’t have lumps.) I wrestled Kate into a swim diaper and rash guard – she was not thrilled. We got out the fun pool toys and I stepped in the pool as I put Kate down to stand in the water.

I yelped as she started crying. We leapt out of the pool. Hose water? Fucking cold. Since it was already 5pm by then there was no way it was going to warm up enough today. Maybe tomorrow. Right?

Except after half an hour the pool was most definitely a lot deflated. It seems there’s a small leak.

On the positive side, the water table I ordered her for her birthday has shipped and should arrive any day now.