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Friday, December 13, 2013

The Patient Merit of the Unworthy Tasks

Hah! Twenty minutes of work this morning and the water flows in my kitchen faucet with no leaks underneath in all the tubing.

You may recall that two days ago I took arms against a sea of troubles (or at least a constant dripping) by beginning the faucet replacement process. It did not start as smoothly as I hoped when slings and arrows of outrageous fortune slowed me down and puzzled the will to finish.

With no functioning kitchen sink, I had begun to remember with fondness the good old days when the old faucet merely dripped and make us rather bear those ills we had because we only needed to turn the faucet aside to keep the drips from pounding across the room to disturb our comfortable lives.

Yesterday, in what I hoped was the last step I needed to acquire the capacity to finish the job, I purchased the correct type of water supply hoses to replace the existing ones that were incapable of being connected to the new faucet (and in one case was too short even if it would have connected).

But what with Christmas shopping that I did in the same trip, I didn't want to risk that I couldn't complete the project in the hour and a half I had before picking up Lamb and Mister from school.

And after I finished with that task, I didn't want to begin it in the short time before game night was scheduled to start and risk turning game night into a seminar on helping me fix my faucet if the process went badly awry.

Mind you, my friends might have enjoyed drinking beer, offering advice standing around the kitchen in rising water, and checking on the progress of the Red Wings as I endured plumbing heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks of new problems.

But for me? Not so much. I put off my fate to grunt and sweat under a weary sink.

So the job remained undone to enjoy gaming, good company, and a few beers with non-healthy salty snacks. Then, to sleep, perchance to dream of plumbing perfection in a new day.

But yes, now it works. With the aerator on, too.


Now I'm drinking coffee and letting the stuff sit to see if with this regard their currents turn awry under the sink.

Then I'll vacuum up the metal bits from the destruction route of old faucet removal; plug in the disposal; and return the waste basket, plastic and paper bags, and two sad potatoes waiting to see if they will be food or tossed as too suspect to trust, to their assigned positions.

And wonder, just what is the deal with a bare Bodkin?

See? Work the problem, and enjoy the native hue of resolution.

Just as the faucet replacement got the most frustrating, it took only 20 more minutes to finish the job. I would have shamed myself as a man and homeowner to have given up and brought in an expensive professional to complete the final tasks. Thus Conscience does make plumbers of us all.

And I have some valuable experience to bring to the last dripping faucet upstairs awaiting replacement.

Although the problem with this type of experience is that it is used so rarely. Will I remember this stuff in 15 years when one of the faucets I put in needs replacement? Alas, I can but wish all my plumbing insights remembered.

And more importantly, will I be able to maneuver myself under the sink to carry it out? Knowledge without the ability to act on that knowledge is more frustrating than ignorance alone.

But other things could go wrong in the near future, too, that I don't expect.

Aye. There's the tub.

Hey, I'm just a solo blogger with a mere decade of typing behind me, so don't expect perfection!