2.10.17

I jokingly told a friend I was considering learning plumbing after moving to Portland, since I found out how difficult it is to find plumbers here. 

I lived to regret those words after sleeping in the next room to a toilet that ran incessantly. I finally got up the courage to change out the innards. I even did the purchasing and wet work by myself. 

Never get too proud of yourself. I still remember the college class I had in which we learned the term HUBRIS.

My birthday was my day off, a coincidence I was pretty excited about. NotSoFarAwaySon was coming over and we were planning to do some cooking together. 

Instead, we spent the afternoon mopping up under the kitchen sink, applying the sink plunger, and mopping up under the kitchen sink. We also mopped up under the kitchen sink, and made two trips to the Ace Hardware for various remedies, after which, we mopped up under the kitchen sink.

On the first trip to Ace, I bought a sink snake. After applying it to no avail, I took off the entire apparatus, cleaned it out and determined that the clog was beyond the pea trap and out of reach of my snake.

Unless I have figured it out, this video will not play by the time this is published. Sorry, it is a thing of beauty, no sink back-up.

Back to Ace and Drano Gel was purchased. The directions said it might be necessary to repeat  the application as many as three times. Five was my magic number.

Clog gone, but not the leak. Back to Ace where they told me I needed gaskets, which I bought.

The sink still leaked.

Back to Ace where they told me I needed to rebuild the apparatus, but they did not have the parts. They gave me the numbers of four plumbers, two of whom never called me back. The other two wanted $170 to walk in the door, then $65 and hour to drive around looking to find the parts that Ace did not carry. If they found the parts, I have no idea how much they would have charged to install them. I can only guess, and it makes me feel faint.

Off to Lowe's, where someone told me to get a chain-lock plier and just, "Tighten her up and see if that doesn't work." Well, it did.

I would prefer not to have any further adventures in plumbing and I would like to say I haven't, but that just isn't true.

I have a drain just before my garage entry. My wonderful brother came over and pressure washed the bricks leading to it, but the drain is blocked somewhere under the garage. The area fills up and washes into the garage between the foundation and the door jamb. 

I foresee a problem. 

For the time being, I have decided to be pleased that my bricks are not slippery any longer and my little rug inside the garage door is just a little cleaner than it was a couple of days ago.