Fan-tastic fault

When my roommate and I were first looking for apartments, we were first and foremost concerned with two things: is it cheap and will we get robbed? Because my last apartment was in the ghetto (seriously, the "hiccup girl" murder event happened right outside of my humble abode), it was understood that my judgement on safe locations was lacking strength. Because we found a place that seemed to fit both our criteria, I never thought to look for other amenities I need. One being a ceiling fan. I cannot cannot cannot sleep without some type of air flow. I sweat, feel stuffy, and I will wake up constantly feeling I'm being choked by stagnant air and my own hot breath.

Our new apartment did not have this luxury because our ceilings are slabs of concrete with spackle and paint laid over it. So, to fix this problem, I rigged up my old box fan (about 18"x18") to the shelf above my bed and leaned it over my upper body using some craft thread I found and tying it to an already existing hook screw in the wall. Here is a rough drawing so you get the idea.

Super sorry for the lame drawing, but you get the idea.

Anyway, I was very proud of my ingenious design. Surprisingly (to me), most others didn't agree with my improvisations. Everyone remarked that it didn't look safe. "What if it falls on your face?". "It won't. I'm an engineer. I know what I'm doing." I would respond, only slightly miffed that people would doubt my genius. My biggest critic was, of course, my fiance. He kept telling me it was going to come undone and fall on my face. "No it's NOT!" I would argue back. "I am smart enough to design something that will not hurt me. It's fine. That shelf will hold 80 lbs of weight, the fan won't slip off because the force of it is going down on the shelf and into the wall. The hook is fine too because I pulled on it, tugged it, tried to wiggle it, and it wouldn't budge. Trust Me. It's fine." Then he'd just roll his eyes and shrug it off. This conversation would repeat itself several more times.

This past weekend I went home to go visit him, his son, and my family. It was a truly long weekend. I had been at work all day Friday, left a little early to drive the 7 hours up to the panhandle from Tampa, spent a busy day Saturday and Sunday morning socializing with everyone who insisted seeing me, and then drove the returning 7 hours back Sunday night and getting in at a whopping 11:30pm at night. I was exhausted to the say the least. But not exhausted enough to leave me immune to horror and embarrassment.

No sooner did I get home then I dumped my stuff on my bedroom floor and noticed the air felt, well... muggy and off. I looked around to see if I had left a glass of juice out or something when I saw it. My fan laying on my air mattress, 7 feet below it's original destination in the EXACT spot where my face would have been if I had been asleep under it.

OH MY GOOD GOOGLY MOOGLY.

There is that sense of relief whenever you realize that something horrible could have happened and it didn't. Like, realizing I could have had a 5 lb block of plastic fall 7 feet onto my money maker, given me a black eye or bust my nose, leaving grated etched scars on my forehead and cheek, and it didn't. Fate was kind and I escaped bodily harm.

Then there's the wave of "Shiitake mushrooms. I can't tell anyone. Especially not him. Oh no, he mustn't know."

But in my family, we have a few strong rules that all of us faithfully abide by. The biggy is that when you do something stupid, you are honor bound to share it. This rule is only further enforced by the fear that if you don't tell and it is discovered by someone else, you suffer only further ridicule because you didn't own up to it in the beginning.

So even though I didn't want to tell my fiance or anyone else, I had this irking feeling like I had too. Plus, I knew it would be kind of funny, and I never ignore the chance for a good laugh.

Before telling the love of my life, I did what any smart woman would do. I set up rules. I told him "... before I tell you what happened, you have to promise to A) not say "I told you so." B) not bring it up in the future as a reference to my stupidity C) not hold it against me and D) not ban me from future improvising projects which you know I'm going to want to participate in." I think at this point he might have already suspected what happened, but he's a good man and agreed to the terms. Of course, I busted out with a hysterical and nervous laughter the first time I told him, so I had to repeat the whole thing so he could understand. Then... there was silence on the phone. And all I hear from his end is a kind of guttural moan and a mumble of "I want to tell you 'I told you so' so bad right now." But no! he agreed to the terms.

He laughed about it, but he asked if I put the fan back up. I told him I could and just use stronger twine this time (the fan failed not due to the shelf, wall hook, or fan itself, but the crappy thread I had used had frayed and broke), but having felt the fear of my face being flattened by a plastic grated fan I decided it would be more safe placed on the floor next to my air mattress.

and that's my fan story.