MORE PLUMBING

 Well, as I reported earlier: HERE , AND HERE  we had some plumbing issues at Christmas which were fixed. The plumber is on holiday but we are making arrangements to get him back to replace all of the old black pvc piping and connections that will surely fail in the future.

Last week I crawled under the house again, right to the far reaches where the plumbing problems have been and, unfortunately at the lowest level of the basement, to see if there were any more leaks. While I couldn't see any leaks from either the old joins or the new joins the ground was soaked and there was a pool of water below some piping that goes up into the end of the house bathroom and laundry. The Old Girl had done some washing that morning so I assumed that there was a leak in the joins somewhere.

I crawled out and asked The Old Girl to give me warning when she was next going to use the washing machine so that I could get myself ready to crawl under again and be in position when the machine rinses and empties. This requires donning knee pads, old clothing and my new ($10 from the OP shop) overalls  and then the disposable overalls that I haven't yet disposed of even after 3 or 4 uses although they are getting a bit ragged.

On Saturday, The Old Girl said she was going to put some washing through so I got ready, told her that I was going to get in position under the laundry area and crawled in again. I waited and then when the washing machine did its first rinse, water pissed out everywhere from a hole in the white pvc pipe that runs down.

This hadn't been easy to see before. I was getting drenched and pressed two fingers into the breech to stem the flow and held them there while the water coursed through the pipes. I felt like that little Dutch joker.

Finger in the dyke (no rude comments please)

I kept pressing my fingers to the hole while the machine went through its cycle (The Old Girl of course had set it to the longest wash cycle!). I was waiting for her to tell me, by calling down through the gap where the laundry pipe goes through to under the house, when the wash load was over. I couldn't hear the machine going so was unable to judge this but kept my fingers pressed on the pipe just in case. I was starting to get cramp so I called out to The Old Girl. No answer so I called out again. No answer so ..... this went on for a while and I, from the cramped position while lying on my back, tried to bang on the floorboards. This was ineffective.

The house is fairly large (280 square metres) which is a large footprint so unless The Old Girl was in the laundry and bathroom area at the end of the house (where I believe she should have been) she would not have heard me. She didn't as she was in the bedroom listening to an audiobook with earphones on!

I tell you!

At normal times, wherever I am The Old Girl can hear what I'm doing.

"What are you doing?" she will call out if I make a noise connected to something she thinks I shouldn't be doing like rummaging in the fridge or pantry for a snack, breaking something, dropping or slopping some food or drink on the floor - all several rooms away from where she is. I don't know how she does it - I think she has bat's ears.

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Yesterday I bought some pvc repair tape from the hardware store and crawled under the house again and wound the tape onto the hole in the downpipe. It's not a pretty job but hopefully it will work for a couple of washes until the plumber gets here.