No water, no water, no water! Arrgh!
There’s not a lot worse than waking up in the morning and finding out you have no water. My 15-year-old son, Jake, had forgotten to turn the hose off in his garden last night. He likes to build big long deep rows and flood them so the roots go deep. His garden is always a good producer, but that was no consolation to me and Sam, 12, as we walked the 300 yards up a hill in a drizzle through tall wet grass to make sure there were no other problems with our spring-fed system. We confirmed that the tank was merely empty and was slowly filling from the spring. Jake, who also stayed up half the night reading Harry Potter, slept til the afternoon so missed the trips to the horse trough to refill the toilet bowl tanks after flushing. We had considered taking a bucket of the horse trough water and dumping it on him as he slept. 
Lenie took the day off in spite of deadline to plant squash in the garden, which is her passion. We had one raised bed that had not been planted, so in a light drizzle she put in crookneck, acorn, and patty pan squash from starts her friend, Alison, of Coquille, Oregon, started for her while we were on our three-week Midwest trip. Very nice of Alison to do that, knowing Lenie needed a head start with the squash because of the lateness of the planting. Lenie, of course, got pretty dirty in the muddy soil but had no water with which to take a shower. 
Jake slept til 2:30. By that time the 3,000-gallon water tank had partly filled, so it was no particular inconvenience to him. We got even with him later by telling him a really nasty joke: “Hey Jake, it’s mid July. You know what that means?” “No, what?” he asked. “It means summer vacation is three quarters over!” 
Just as my other boys did when I told them, Jake, who really hates school, went into shock and disbelief. We let the horror of it sink in before we told him we were only kidding. Mean joke, but deserved.
