Fun With Plumbing Part Deux

I'm back, and everything is clean and put away again. I decided to take off for a whole week and do some major spring cleaning. Last year I wasn't able to do it because of my back pain and other personal problems. I conquered one to two rooms each day. Then I rested and went on from there to the next room the next day. I could have done the whole house over one weekend but now it's just too much for me. I actually was able to attack the windows and window blinds this time, which if I had my way, I would have taken them outside and used the power washer on them. YES REALLY!! They hadn't been cleaned in years. They were so bad David thought about buying a new set. The worst ones were in the TV room. The puppies leave little nose prints all over them when looking out the windows for squirrels. But it's all done and the house is clean. I'm quite happy now.

David finally tackled that pipe problem and the water from the washroom pipes is draining quite nicely now. No more water in the kitchen sink or on the roof from the overflow. After he replaced the pipes coming from the washroom to the main drain he was at a total loss as to why the water kept backing up into my kitchen sink. The week before last he had poured two bottles of drain cleanout into the pipe from the cleanout that he had been playing with for the past three weekends. He waited for a few hours as the destructions on the label stated. Then he flushed the pipe with hot water from the washer. The water still came up into the kitchen sink He thought about it overnight and then took last week Thursday off and decided to snake the whole drain system. He started with the pipe above on the roof then worked on the pipe below the kitchen window. Nothing worked. Then he remembered when there was a nasty drain backup from the city that sent stinking water into the tub(after he got divorced and before he met me).

He had called the plumbers when that happened thinking the sewer pipe had collapsed. That call cost him $800 to put in a new cleanout in the front side of the house. The episode back in 2000 was a blessing in disguise because he went to that cleanout this past weekend and put the snake down the pipe as far as the snake would go, nothing came out. No gunk at all.

He was so pissed off that he came into the kitchen where I was cleaning out the pantry and slumped down into the breakfast barstool and started rambling about losing his mind. I was doing one laundry load and asked if it was okay to restart the washer and finish it. He said that I may as well he had to go call the plumber. I asked what he was doing all this time and he told me.

During that time the laundry water was emptying. But it wasn't making that gurgling sound in the kitchen sink. I walked over to the sink to watch for the water. Nothing. NOTHING was coming up into the sink! I screamed for David to come into the kitchen. He ran and saw what I saw. No gurgling, no water, no water sounds in the sink pipe, OMG!! We hugged each other and he ran out the front door to see if the water was coming through to the open cleanout he had been working on. The water was flowing smoothly. He was going crazy and shouting. He told me to refill the washer and set it to let the water out again. Nothing came up into the sink. He was screaming and dancing in the yard when I told him. I asked him what did he do? He couldn't tell me because he didn't know. He really didn't know what he had done to solve the problem. So we are at a total loss as to what it was, and what to do if the problem happens again.We did celebrate, though. He took me to our favorite steak place for a nice dinner. Yes Saltgrass!

It's Monday

During Sunday and Monday, we had thunderstorms and rain. This in turn caused a few brownouts, and on Monday we lost our cable DVR to the power surge. So I called Time Warner for help because we were getting a strange message on the DVR stating it needed to update after the last brownout. Well, I ended up calling them twice and nothing on their end seemed to work. So, I called David who was upset about the fact that we had to exchange the DVR. He was not pleased and took the time off anyways. 

He came home at 3PM and took the DVR to New Braunfels for a new one. I hooked it up and it didn't work so I called Time Warner again. I made an appointment with them to send a tech out to check the outside box on Wednesday. As you can guess, David was not happy. Turning in the DVR meant that he would lose all the TV shows and movies that he had saved on that DVR, so you can imagine how even more pissed he was that we wouldn't have cable either until then. 

On Wednesday, the cable TV tech came early to the house. checked the message on the cable and then went outside to check the box and the connections. He had to replace the whole cable line from the pole across the street to our house. Turns out the squirrels in the area had been chewing on the cable connection on the pole. He then set up the HD box in our bedroom so we could get better cable reception in there. He was there for only a half hour and we had everything back. Well except for David's TV shows he had taped on the DVR. He treated it like it was the end of his world. Shit!

During last week, I was able to get a whole lot of Spring cleaning done too. I divided the house up into days. The bedroom and bathroom on Monday. Tuesday was the TV/ computer room, etc, etc... I was so glad to get everything done by the end of the week and that included the laundry before Friday. I paid for it this past weekend with my usual back pain, but it was damned well worth it. Which reminds me, I need to call my doctor to get a prescription renewal. I am totally out of my pain meds.

How To Make A List For Spring Cleaning

I've been thinking, I have to get started on cleaning house this house.  Ewwwwwww! Yes, I know. Everyone is running, screaming, panicking, through their own home. But don't dispare my minions. I have a solution to this maddening thing called house work. It's called sit the hell down and have your coffee and draw up a plan of attack.

Yes, my dears, go grab a nice pen and a tablet of paper to write on. Oh you don't have a nice pen or tablets of paper?? The get dressed all warm and cozy and schlep to the car and try to dig it out of the snow. I know, you hate shoveling snow. But hey that's what that nice hunky guy across the way is for. Go get him and sweet talk him into helping.

Mmkay, the car is shoveled out of the snow and he even started it up for you while you are watching from the window slurping nice hot coffee and fantasizing. What a sweet dude, yet so stupid. Well you got the car and you drive away waving bub - by. Car is warm and toasty and it's almost lunch now. Hmmmm. Call your bff and do lunch at that cool new Italian spot you saw two weeks ago.

Ahhh. Now that was a lunch. Tell bff lets go shopping. I want that blouse I saw at the boutique yesterday ... hoping it's still there. Oh we have to hit that nice jeans boutique. Oh it's so nice to go shopping on a day like this, I feel so energized. Kiss, kiss bff. Off she goes.

Awww. The hunky guy was so nice as to shovel the snow off your walk and driveway. What a sweetie. Grab the goodies and go inside. Hide the tags in the trash and hang the clothes in the middle of the closet. Hubby won't know. I better fix dinner, he's coming home in an hour. OMG!!! This house needs a good cleaning. I'll do a list tomorrow morning. I'll need to go out and get a good pen and paper for it though.