Plumbing relief within reach...

I know, I know. I said I was moving out if the plumbing wasn't fixed yesterday, but there were mitigating circumstances. The septic guys came. They pumped. They even put a ladder inside and went down into the [pardon] bowels of the tank. There's a job we can all be grateful that someone else does for us.

There was a collapsed inlet pipe that needs to be replaced. I called the plumber who was at the town jail, dealing with frozen pipes. He said he could be here first thing in the morning. Whew.
Then last night, he called back saying he couldn't make it, I'd have to find someone else because his biggest commercial account, TRW, had burst pipes that would take all day. At least he called. He recommended a friend who is an excavator, and that fellow said that he could come out, depending on whether it was warm enough for his 'quipment to start.

Mom and I got up early, packed some stuff and went off to Ray's rental house (still being readied to rent) for running toilets and copious hot water showers. Wow. That feels good! We stopped at the laundromat for a quick load of wash and zipped home to walk the dog and dry the wash. And wait for Mr. Excavator, "Bo."

Bo came at noon and excavated. He fixed the collapsed inlet pipe. In the meantime, I went down to the basement and found water all over the floor, backed up again! Apparently the water softener did its programmed regurgitation thing last night and filled the pipes with water again, and it was still not draining right. I showed the guys, and they had no snake, but wait! Bill bought one on Saturday (but didn't tell me where he put it), maybe I could find it? Amazingly, I did spot it, and they snaked out 50 feet from the floor drains. No luck. They snaked it from the septic end and ran into a solid clog about 2 feet from the end. "Am I going to have to call someone else?" I asked. "Maybe..." Bo said.

He made a hook on the flat end of the snake and managed to pull out the clog, and leapt out of the way as about 50 gallons of effluvia gushed out of the pipe. This has been clogged and broken for longer than we've lived here, he said. I'm convinced that all it took to make it quit completely was Bill getting on a ship.

Now my plumbing "heroes" are out getting the parts they need to finish the job, and it looks like we'll have a working system again (crossed fingers) by tonight. If indeed this is the end of this plumbing nightmare, whatever he wants to charge me is just fine. I will write the check and wish him a Merry Christmas.

Toilets. Running water, hot and cold. Yes, it's the little (and believe me, they are not so little anymore!) things in life I am so grateful for!