Just an ordinary day

Tuesday morning I got up to just another ordinary day, I thought. I planned to house clean the living room, shampoo the carpet, etc. When I finished my shower, my hubby opened the bathroom door and asked if I had looked at the water in the toilet or shower. Well, no, who looks at the water in the shower? I had noticed the shower floor was slicker than usual, so slick that I held onto the grab bar that is in the shower when I got out of it. I looked at the water in the toilet. Wow! What a surprise! It looked like clay mud. I ran some water in the lavatory as I toweled and dressed. I had stopped it up so the water would remain in the sink. It was awful! And I had showered and washed my hair in that water! When I released the water in the sink, it left a clay gritty sediment in the sink.
So I go to the phone, look up the number of the afterhours water department and called it. I did not identify myself, just asked what was wrong with the water on our street. He said there had been a big water main break and it would be a while before it was repaired. I asked about the safety of the water. I asked him if it was safe to drink. Of course, I was not about to drink that filthy stuff. He said he would not drink it! He said when it was repaired we'd have to run the water in all our faucets to clear the pipes. Naturally I did not have any water saved for an emergency. That was Lesson Number One learned! Have a couple of gallons of water saved for emergencies.
We did not have coffee that morning, because I did not want to use what little water I had in the filter pitchers for coffee. No brushing the teeth either! In a couple of hours the water was running clear so we flushed all the pipes and the hot water heater. We learned when we received our afternoon newspaper that a really huge water main had broken and sent a river of water down the street going into town from our house. The houses on our side of the main street were not supposed to have been effected, just the streets and houses across the main street from us. Wrong again! We got all that mud! And our neighbor below us had no water pressure.

Moral of this incident. I will save water in a couple of gallon jugs, refreshing it weekly, for just such a time as we are out of water again. We commented later that we have had really good utility service here. Our electricity is rare off for more than a few minutes and this the first time the water had not been clean. In 25 years, that's a pretty good record!