Bah Humbug Indeed

You will have to excuse me if my feelings for this particular time of year are slightly skewed to the negative. It has been quite the weekend.

The bathroom plumbing went from draining to thinking about draining over the course of November. I did do the whole Draino bit but that didn't seem to alleviate the problem. On the 2nd, I took a shower in preparation for the office Christmas dinner and it seemed the "thinking about draining" had gone to "Oooh shiny! You want me to do what now?" I grabbed the plunger and plunged away and heard, coming from the basement, dripdripdripdripdripdrip.

Cripes. There was a leak. It seemed to be at the joint where the tub meets the plumbing. Just what I need.

The boss was gone all of last week; meetings and sales calls and all sorts of things; so my ability to take time off to deal with the bathroom was limited. I washed up in the kitchen, late at night, under the cover of darkness, washing one half of my body one day and the other half another day. You read the post about that. Finally, I said, no more. This is kind of a quality of life issue here. When you can't even use your sink because it backs up into the tub, it's gotta be fixed. So, last Friday, I made the appointment for the plumber to come on Monday. I have the days off that I can use and my boss said I really need to take them. I took the whole day.

I go home on Friday and decide I will relax by playing WOW. The Mac won't boot up. Frantic text messages with friends seemed to determine that my hard drive is dying a very slow death. It chose Friday to stop working properly, would not boot up at all.

I sat in my recliner and just cried. I try, I really do, to provide for myself, to save for the rainy days that come up. I had just stuff a bunch of cash into my meager savings account. I was feeling very proud of myself. Poof. It's gone. Karma is making sure I don't feel too smug? I promise I wasn't. I was just feeling good about being able to have that little extra. (sigh)

So, the weekend was filled with cleaning, sorting, crafting, watching TV and worrying...and worrying. I kept telling myself there was nothing I could do about the situation. It is what it is and worrying or fretting about things won't make it any better. There goes the trip to Iowa, assuming I could have the girls cared for. The money I would have used for gas has gone down the drain, figuratively. I'm going to need cat food before the paycheck comes. If it's a choice between gas and groceries, well, you can guess which one I'm going to choose.

Gratitude. Gratitude. Gratitude.

If ever there was a time when I needed to practice gratitude, this is it. I have a house and heat and food and things to do that don't involve the Internet. I can come into the office and do my banking and clean out my email during the weekend, if I feel the need. It's not like I'm completely cut off. After the plumber left on Monday, I finished cleaning the kitchen and sweeping the bathroom and kitchen floors. I can now wash them. There was much good accomplished yesterday. The girls are thrilled that I'm in the living room and not in the office. Man, TV is really a vast wasteland and I've not missed anything great, although that PBS special on racoons was very interesting.

Gratitude.

It's tough to see beyond the dollar signs going out your door. It's tough to not fall into the "Oh woe is me" trap. This is just a temporary blip in life. Yeah, I sometimes feel like all I do is go from pothole to pothole but it's okay. I'll make it through.

Beverage:  water

Deb

Something Worked

It's been quite the Monday. The tub has ceased to drain properly and when I run water in the bathroom sink, it backs up into the tub, so the clog is somewhere beyond that intersection. I need to move stuff in the basement so the plumber can get to that section of pipes. There's also a small leak where the tub meets the drain. AND, I can't actually have a plumber out until maybe Friday afternoon because we're so busy, I'm the only one in the office for a good portion of this week.

But, remembering this is the year of gratitude, I can wash up in the kitchen sink. I'll wash my hair at night instead of in the morning and I can wash sections of body parts at night too and wash other sections in the morning. I was remembering my childhood last night, as I plotted all this out. We had a tub. We did not have a shower. Gram had a shower and it was such a treat to go visit and take a shower at her house. What a nifty idea that was.

We took a bath once a week, more in the summer if our feet were really dirty or if mom looked behind our ears and you could grow a garden there. This idea of a daily shower or bath was rather foreign to us. We washed faces, hands, arms daily. I washed my hair twice a week. We didn't think this was abnormal at all. Even now, if I am not going anywhere over a weekend and have no prospects of being near people, I may not take a shower all weekend, pulling my hair up into a pony tail. This concept of a daily bath or shower is truly American and isn't needed unless you do hard physical work or exercise and work up a heavy sweat.

I kind of feel like karma is getting me back for thinking, after paying bills on Saturday and moving money into my savings account, that I was doing rather well for the end of the year. I can pay a plumber, which is wonderful, but there goes my feeling flush in the savings department.

So, I guess I can be forgiven for thinking all is right with the world, except for my plumbing. I have to go to the post office and start the mailing so I was loading up my lunch and my bag of presents. I need to remember that these girls won't go outside. They weren't raised outside. It's really a foreign, scary place for them. (Plus, today is rainy.)  I can leave the back door open while I make sure I have everything. Force of habit is to close the door as you're leaving to make sure a cat doesn't get out and that's what I did. I got to the car, looked around for my purse and realized it was sitting on the kitchen counter.

Pam has said, repeatedly, that she's just 5 minutes away and all I have to do is call her and she'll come over and unlock my front door. Then I don't have to crawl in through the office window. I looked back at the house. Call her. My phone is in my purse. I have the office windows covered with window kits. Plus, Pam is not in Wheaton. He's in Pennsylvania, bonding with her new grandson. That would be a bit of a wait for her to unlock the front door. Wait! After the last time I did this, I could have sworn I put a key in the center well of the Jeep. I dived into the well. Maps, hand sanitizer, flashlight, spare tire lock, sunscreen, KEY!

The next step was remembering which door this goes to. I finally decided I couldn't be smart enough to make it the back door so I trotted around to the front of the house. You guessed it. It was the back door key. Oh well. I retrieved my purse and happened to notice that I had not grabbed the keys off the key holder in the kitchen. I would have gotten out to the car and had to go back inside. Probably fitting for a Monday.

So, back in the center well went the key. Will I remember the next time I lock myself out? Probably not and I'll have that panic start to settle in when I try to remember if I did or did not put a key in the car. But, finally, after years of climbing in the office window, I did something smart and it paid off. Huzzah for me.

Beverage:  Wild Berry tea

Deb

The Side Effect of Laundry

I'm still not caught up with the wash. The implied prohibition on going up and down the basement stairs means I'm behind. I just did a load of bedding because I had to change the sheets on the bed and had one set of clean sheets left. (Side note: does anyone know where to get one flannel sheet? I have two top sheets but the fitted bottoms have gone into the rag box. I don't want to give these top sheets away as they are still in excellent condition. Maybe I should use them to make a shirt or a jumper. Hmmmmmm.) Other clothing has taken precedence because, well, I need clean pants and underwear and socks on a daily basis; not so clean sheets.

I also want to do full loads of clothing. Back in March, when I had the sewer line rodded out, the plumber said one of the way to keep the line clear was to do at least one full load a week. When it's just you and you're all caught up with the wash, that can be a daunting prospect. Now that I've been told to cut down the number of times a week that I go up and down those stairs, getting a full load is much easier. I've taken to sorting stuff by item. Here's the pants pile, the tee-shirt pile, the underwear pile, the sock pile. When I do a load of pants, if there's room, I add something else to fill up the machine.

The side effect of doing a mass amount of one type of clothing is that, suddenly, the drawer goes from empty to overfull. The sock drawer is a case in point. I have so many socks. I love socks. I love their variety. I love how you can wear striped socks and no one blinks twice. Wear those same stripes in a shirt and you're used as landing lights at O'Hare. If it's a gray day outside, wearing those bright green socks at the upper left in the photo adds much needed sunshine. I may have to be conservative in twill pants and a polo shirt, but I can wear Halloween socks in May and express myself.

But, the drawer only holds so many socks. Lately, I've been washing socks faster than I've been wearing them. The drawer is overstuffed. I always reach down to the bottom and take a pair down there. If I only took off the top, the same pairs of socks would be worn all the time and I've got great ones down at the bottom. Today's choice was the pair of red socks with green Christmas trees on them you see in the left middle. They had been buried to the bottom. I reached in, grabbed something and that's what's on my feet.

I probably need a bigger drawer, but I'm not sure where I'd put the socks. Frankly, it's kind of fun to pull open the drawer and have socks spring up and fall out thanks to being compressed. It's like they are saying, "Wear me! Wear me!" I need to do another load of dark pants tonight. Time to root through the wash in the laundry chute and add socks to make a full load.

Beverage:  Earl Grey tea

Deb

There's a Reason Pam's Promotes Efficiency

Waiting for a plumber to arrive is the perfect time to work on the next project. This involves yards of fabric which needs to be cut into pieces and reassembled. The weekend, when I was up and around, involved clearing off the table in the living room so my very ancient cardboard cutting board could lie on top of it. As you would imagine, the cutting board was "claimed" but she moved when I went to unfold the thing. It's kind of unwieldy but it's been my go to tablet for years of sewing.

Once unfolded, the fabric can be laid on top. That's when, at least in my house, things get 'interesting'. I got one piece pinned. I was going to have to do some creative cutting as this print has a direction and I want the pieces to go in the same direction. While measuring and marking, the 'help' arrived.

I've never understood why every cat who has decided to lie down on my fabric choices then chooses to attack it. Shakespeare, Penney and Half-Pint would always jump up, lie down and then attack the fabric. Pilchard was no different. She balled it up and chewed and raked it with her claws. It didn't damage the fabric at all, but she's definitely in the way. I tugged on the fabric which seemed to encourage her pouncing. Then I decided to give her a "loving" and she bolted. I can almost hear her, "Awk! Mom wants to give me a loving! I can't stand that!"

At Pam's, if you remember from the earlier this year pinning, at her house, the dress I wore to Carole's wedding, I don't have to pin around, over or under a cat. I don't have to carefully remove a cat from a pattern piece and hope she doesn't extend her claws and tear the tissue paper. I don't have to remove a tail as I'm cutting along a line. I also have the laughter and commentary of a good friend.

As it happened, the project is all cut out, with Pilchard's help. I can put the sewing machine back on the table and begin sewing this.

Through all the action, Mija merely supervised. She spends a lot of time perched on the back of the recliner just watching the world. She has been a bit irritated with me as the sewing accouterments have taken over a section of the recliner. It won't be until I get the project 80% finished and leave it on the table that she will give her stamp of approval by lying on it.

Beverage:  Water

Deb

In Working Order

What does this look like to you? If you said that my kitchen sink needs a cleaning, well, that would be part of it.

The plumber came today. Huzzah! My sink is draining again.

He was 45 minutes late. I know the nature of plumbing is such that there is no way you can know, walking into a house, if the job is going to take 20 minutes or 2 hours. So, I can cut them some slack. He was polite. He was professional. There was no "plumber's crack", if you get my drift.

He took the pipes off under the sink, hooked up the rodder and let 'er go. He rodded the whole line from the sink to where it meets the sewer line. I'm used to having my sewer line rodded so I am aware of the noise. This was a murmur compared to that gigantic machine that's used outside. Still, his presence scared Mija and Pilchard who ran to hide until the experience was over.

It took a half hour and cost less than half what the gal estimated it would cost. To say I am thrilled is a slight understatement. That excess I had budgeted can go into my savings account for the next rainy day item that breaks. Actually, I need an oil change and to get the steering dampener fixed on the Jeep. That's a good use for the extra cash.

I cannot wait to run hot water into my sink to scrub it out and then fill it with water and dish detergent to finish off the dishes I didn't get washed last night. I don't need to examine my supper and rule out x or x because the pans used to make those dishes won't fit in the bathroom sink. I can make more cookies and applesauce and punkin bread and all sorts of goodies. If you need a plumber, ask me. I'll add my name to the chorus of recommendations for these people.

Beverage:  Water

Deb

Five for Ten Dollars

The plumber comes tomorrow morning to fix the sink. To say I'm looking forward to that is a bit of an understatement. No more dishes in the bathroom sink and I can go back to cooking and baking and making all kinds of wonderful smelling messes in my kitchen.

But, in the interim, I have to consider what I fix for lunches and suppers so the resulting dishes fit in the bathroom sink. The best course of action, I decided, was to stock up on frozen dinners. Thankfully, they were on sale. Yesterday's breakfast was one of the items I purchased.

This is a Smart Ones French Toast and Turkey Sausage meal. The sausage was good. The french toast was very hard to cut. They give you a syrup packet but it says "One use only" and advises you to toss it away if you don't use it. That can't be "real" syrup in the packet then, if it's not something that can be stored if you don't use it. I have my own syrup which I used.

Lunch today is Lean Cuisine's Orange Sesame Chicken and the last container of yogurt. I can recycle all the package parts and all I have left to wash is the cutlery. If I use the plastic utensils we have in the office, I don't have anything to wash when I get home.

These dinners were 5 for $10.00. At $2.00 a piece, that's probably less than what I can make them for at home. Are they a good value? I'm on the fence about that. Easy and convenient yes, but the ingredient list has things I can't pronounce which makes them less than ideal for watching what one consumes. I just have to get through today and the first thing I want to make tomorrow when I get home from work is this corn, potato and bacon chowder recipe I found. I can almost smell it cooking right now.

Beverage:  English Breakfast tea

Deb

Open Completely

I've always had problems with tree roots in the sewer line from the house to the street. It's been at least 18 years ago when we added the clean out in the front so the plumber didn't have to drag his machine into the basement to rod out the line. At the time we did that, it would have cost a good $5,000 to replace the line from the clean out to where it joins the city sewer because the junction is in the middle of the street. It would have meant a permitting process to dig up and replace the street. Plus, my line enters the sewer at what would be considered 10:00 and that kind of attachment is prone to have problems with stuff getting hung up and blocking my line as well as stuff from my line not going into the city line straight.

Back in mid-January, I noticed water on the basement floor. I figured it was getting to be about time to clear the line. Roughly every 14-18 months, I'd have the plumber come out and clear the line. It was still cheaper than the replacement as it will take a lot of years of rodding to equal $5,000. I figured after I got my tax money, I would have it done. The line stopped draining last Monday. My tax refund came the previous Friday. Good timing.

Now, about the plumber. I have used one guy for the last 18-odd years. 14 months ago, when I last had the line rodded, he charged me $325 for what amounted to 15 minutes. I knew a guy who did plumbing for a living in Indiana and he said I'd gotten taken. "It should only cost, at the most, $70 to open a line. Anything more is a rip off." So, I have been watching for these coupon booklets I occasionally get in the mail. One happened to come last week. Leafing through it, I found a company that will rod out the line for $50. I called and they sent a guy out on Wednesday afternoon.

For $50, he opened the line but that's not really going to solve the problem. If I had $10,000, I could completely replace the line from the house to the street with a seamless pipe that would handle things once and for all, but that's not an option. What he discovered is that the line really hadn't been cleaned out to it's full diameter of 6 inches. He had opened it to 3 inches but that was slow going. It seems my former plumber just stuck a 1 inch rodder in and chewed the line open enough to get the water flowing. No wonder his guarantee was 3 months.

For $300, he would open the line up completely and give me a one year guarantee. That seemed like a very good deal. It took him 2 hours to do this. He said it seemed as if the line had never been fully cleared back to the house. When he did it, when he got to the junction of the interior and exterior lines, which are just outside the basement wall, I knew it. I know ground vibrations and these were vibrations. Scared the cats. But, it is completely done.

Now comes the maintenance. Because it's just me, I'm not sending enough volume of water through the line to flush out the debris that accumulates. Once a week, I should do a completely full load of wash or run the washing machine on a full cycle even if I don't have enough clothes to do it. I also need to fill up the tub and let it drain. Doing those will keep the line clear. I should have them out once a year for the $50 rodding, of course I should, but maybe $50 is a small price to pay for not having sewage in the basement.

He also told me to stop using Liquid Plumr on my slow drains. If you have had a plumber come to your house, you may have heard this. These acids slowly eat away at your pipes and cause failure over time. I always keep a bottle in the bathroom. The shower and sink drains can start to run slow and my ability to use a snake to dislodge a clog is zero. I have tried but I cannot get the snake through the "U" joint.

I hear you, plumbers. I acknowledge what you say and it makes sense. BUT, I am not paying you $150 for 5 minutes of work with a snake to free a clog when 3 ounces of Liquid Plumr when the drain starts running slow will keep it clear for 6 months. Sorry. I have a feeling that the more flushing of the lines that I do, will help keep the bathroom and kitchen lines clear without the need to use this.

Today, I have washed 2 rugs and a pile of bedding that were on the floor in the water. I also did a full load of pants. I look at the loads I have yet to do and I'll be all caught up with my wash by Wednesday. I guess I'll need to write myself a note to "flush lines" about mid-month.

Now comes the clean up. I have to stop by the store tomorrow and buy two big bottles of bleach to disinfect the floor. You know, it was a bit up front for me; thank goodness for the tax refund. But I feel more secure having had this done.

Beverage:  Hot Cocoa

Deb

So now what do I do?

I was doing dishes on Tuesday night and I could hear water dripping. I went into the basement but it was not down there. I opened up the cabinet under the sink and there is a leak under the sink. When I let the water out of the sink, it really drips.

So, on the agenda for this weekend is to remove everything under the sink, toss, clean and disinfect things. Then, I need to figure out where the leak actually is and do something about it. I think, based on what I could see at night under the sink, that it's coming from where the pipe meets that drain. I'm wondering, if I can get that area bone dry, if I can silicone caulk all the way around that joint and seal it. Will that work? I certainly cannot pay a plumber to come look at this.

The other problem I have to solve is why my windshield wipers won't work. (Try saying that 5 times fast.) It's not that they are intermittent, it's that they won't work, period. It was raining on the way to work this morning. I took the back roads and drove 30. There is only a quarter mile stretch where there's any traffic that I was more than a bit concerned about. But something has to be done.

I was supposed to go into the city Saturday to have lunch with Tonia but if I can't get the wipers working, I can't go. It's supposed to rain from now through Sunday evening. I have to get a few groceries but the store is just over the hill. In nice weather, I can walk there. That's not an issue. I have to run to the DMV to deal with a duplicate title for Carole's car but I can't do that without wipers.

If it's not pouring down rain when Rodney gets back from the job he's on at the moment, we're going to look at the fuses. Maybe it's something simple like a fuse. Again, I cannot afford to have to take the car in for a repair. There is no money for this. I need an oil change and I can't afford that.

So, I need to be careful in where I go until this is fixed or the weather is clear. It's really okay because I don't go anywhere as it is. I just do kind of need to have this fixed, however.

Beverage: Scottish Blend tea

Deb