"Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion.  I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward."  ~Kurt Vonnegut

I have a friend whose husband is away for training. It isn't a deployment, but it is a long separation. Separation or deployment, there is this phenomenon that happens when a Soldier or Service member goes away. One or many things in the house and life go haywire.
My friend had a string of unfortunate events, culminating in the lack of hot water in the house until more gas could be bought on Monday. With two teenage girls, that is a catastrophe!
In Korea it was the car battery going dead. $40 worth of taxi rides back and forth with a toddler and car batteries in my lap, followed by myself and a nice Korean taxi cab driver hooking up a battery in a Toyota truck is the way that story ended.
In Germany, we had an animal move into the attic. I researched and then undertook quite a hostile operation against "said" animal. I collected all of my dog's shed hair in a bag, bought 7 of the super strength toilet hanging thingy's, a new battery operated radio and a flashlight as well as a bottle of ammonia. During the day, when the animal was out, I went up into the attic, scared to death, and poured ammonia on the areas where the animal had pooped, sprinkled the dog hair everywhere to simulate another animal moving in, turned the radio on a rock station, kept the light on and ran out of the attic. From the base of the attic ladder I lobbed in the toilet cleaning things (because I was too afraid to stay in the attic that long) and then shut the entryway. If anyone would have gone into that area it would have looked like I was practicing some type of alternate religion. The animal never came back. God only knows what my neighbors or the kids must have thought of my erratic behavior.
It has to be Murphy's Law, that anything that can go wrong will go wrong, when a Soldier or Service member is away from their home. These events make those of us that are left at home appreciate the addition of a soul mate in our life. What seems like a small issue when you are together, becomes a huge undertaking when done alone. It accentuates the void that is left and makes the days all the harder.
My friend handled her troubles like most military wives I know, with a super dose of laughter. Her phone calls and emails were all girded in an amazing sense of humor. The weekend went by, the issues were cleared up and she has earned another great story to add to the many that have happened before.  That is the way we do things. Military wives roll up their sleeves, take the punches, lean on each other and keep an amazing sense of humor.