Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Dipstick & The Plumbing Problem




If you thought Dipstick only knew how to change tires and dish out sassy advice, well you’d be wrong. Turns out she has quite a skill with a pipe wrench too. When I was visiting my family, my sister and I accompanied my Dad up to his summer place to turn the water on. Dad injured his hand and Mary and I had to do all the work. Actually, I did all the work, because Mary didn’t want to get her pants dirty.

The winter in Upstate New York gets fucking cold. So when you leave a place in the Fall, you have to drain all the pipes of water and shut down the plumbing. Otherwise, the pipes will freeze and burst. Come Spring, after the ice has gone out, you check the pipes for leaks, reconnect everything, turn it on and pray that there’s not a leak.

But every year, there is a leak. Which I was actually kind of happy about, because it meant I got to crawl into the cob-webbed pump house, poke around the mouse droppings until I found the leak and repair the broken pipe. After a quick trip to the hardware store for parts, I was cutting and reattaching my first pipe. My sister documented the whole thing. Here are a few clips.




5 comments:

Lipstick said...

Wow, Dip. Very impressive!

Anonymous said...

You make it sound like your are now a master plumber!

Nohodyke

Darryl Iorio said...

It was sweet of you to help out your dad with his plumbing problem. And yes, doing some DIY work around the house can be fun and exciting. Although it looks tedious, the end-result is quite rewarding. Having a no-leak situation in your plumbing system is definitely a sweet reward!

Gayle Manning said...

As I read your story, I can feel that you really enjoy plumbing, huh! :D Haven’t you thought about becoming an expert on the field? Hehe! I mean, the more you do plumbing work, the more knowledge and experience you get. Your family are really lucky to have you because they don’t need to hire a plumber anymore. Haha!

Elia Lester said...

It looks like your sister knows a thing or two about plumbing! It is nice to have someone in the house who knows how to do quick fixes on these problems. And based on the video, she really knows what she is doing. She is like a pro! Good job for both of you!