Hell, Plumbing Division

[kaffy_r]

Down With the Back Up

Do not — do not —  speak to me of plumbing.

• My home smells like a septic tank.
• The "waste water" was oh, so much more.
• To get to an access point, they had to tear up the floor, because the previous plumbers cemented over the pipe they'd put in. For, you know, access.
• The carpet is cut up, wet, and peeled back in the hall.
• The cats are traumatized.
• As they searched for possible starting points for our problems, the new professional plumbers found out that one of the building's water heaters is leaking.
• And did I mention that my house smells like a dead civet in a drainpipe?

Comments

[idiomagic.livejournal.com]

Oh gods...you have my complete sympathy.

Same thing happened to me last year...sewage everywhere, no working toilet for two days. And I had the stomach flu at the time...*shudders*

Baking soda will go a long ways towards relieving the smell...sprinkle it on the floors, the carpets, everywhere you can...liberally

Good luck, and hang in there...
xoxoxo

[kaffy_r]

Oh, wow: your situation sounds as if it was worse in some ways than this. And thanks for the baking powder suggestion.

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

Baking soda. The good news is, baking soda tends to be the cheaper of the two products.

That Gross icon is perfect. I wish you didn't need it.

(Yeah, and beggars everywhere are welcome to start riding anytime now.)

[kaffy_r]

Whups. Yup. Baking soda it is. Luckily, I have an industrial sized bag of the stuff. (A 5-pounder from Costco when I got it. It's down to about 3 pounds now. Heh.)

And thanks - I do so love my "Gross" icon!

[davidschroth.livejournal.com]

It sounds like you *really* need to spread the word about previous plumber. Not that that helps your situation, or makes you feel any better about the damage previous plumber wreaked...

[kaffy_r]

Yes, I think that I'd best go root out the bills, so I can remember the company name, and perhaps put out a comment on yelp.com .

(Oh, and I just *had* to use this icon. It seems ... apropos .... )

[tardis-stowaway.livejournal.com]

Ack! That sounds like an epically bad situation. Umm, at least they found the leaking water heater before that particular problem got any worse? Anyway, virtual comfort chocolate to you.

[kaffy_r]

MMMMMMmm, virtual chocolate — thanks!

Also, your icon? Rocks.

Another also? I had to use this icon because it, too, just seems to fit, but has nothing to do with my joy over virtual Internet chocolate.

Uhm. Yeah, I'm tired and spacey, why do you ask?

[lydy.livejournal.com]

Oh, my dear me. Sewage backup is the worst. I hope that the baking soda works -- sounds like you have enough of it. Hopefully they'll have fixed the problem this time.

[kaffy_r]

Things are on the downhill side of beginning to be commencing to be close to being fixed at this point. And they've revised their comment re sewage, following more checks. It's apparently still safely "waste water" and not classic sewage. However, the non-crap crap that's been in the the pipes and catch basin has been there long enough to do in the pipes what food, etc. does in our lower GI tract. So it smells like crap.

TMI, I know.

Might be too long...formatting sucks...

[madtruk.livejournal.com]

A story instead of a comment: - Back in the day, when my family lived in the northern suburb of Minneapolis known as Columbia Heights, we had sewer lines and drains and the things that make civilization possible (like flush toilets) and problematic (like flush toilets). This story is not about flush toilets. - Rather it is about what is known as a “drain trap.” What is a drain trap, you might be asking yourself right now, the very same question I asked myself when I was told I would need to clean them? Drain traps are so named because every vile, disgusting, unbelievably that came from a member of my family type of physical material gets (ready?) “trapped” there, and when enough gunk gets trapped there, it can cause issues. Major, non-draining, OH MY GOD WHAT THE HELL IS THAT issues. - I dutifully removed the covers of my drain traps because our kitchen sink had decided, probably with reason, that it would no longer perform the major function of drainage, and nothing we could do with snakes, chemicals, or plungers would convince it otherwise. Expecting a mess, I had a rather large bucket underneath the trap. Imagine my surprise when nothing, but nothing came out. And then, of course the AHA! Of course nothing came out-it’s trapped in the sink! - So there’s me. A large bucket. Two sinks full of water that is no longer the color of water and in fact falls somewhere between ‘oil change’ and ‘fish died in the tank 3 weeks ago.’ Oh and a neighbor’s kid (Matt, who we shall call Matt for the purpose of this story) and my son Casey, who is always THE BOY. “Hey Matt!” “Yeah?” “Is the bucket under the trap?” “Yeah!” “Cool. I’m going to try turning on the garbage disposal.” … Thinking back, to where this all goes horribly, horribly wrong, I’m convinced of two things: 1. I should have got a bigger (boat) bucket. And 2. I should have paid more attention in Physics (Magic Tricks for Social Studies Majors) 101. - Imagine, if you will, you are Dorothy (in a scientific experimental way, not in a “look at me I’m wearing a dress and a small dog (yes I know a misplaced verb when I see one)” way), and you are looking up at the bottom of a funnel cloud. You know that as you continue to look up, the funnel cloud widens, but from where you are, the pinpoint of devastation, all the power of that funnel is aimed right at your head. So, you wake up in Kansas and it’s really not so bad after all (and you’re not sober in Nebraska so there’s that). Now, use that visual metaphor and move to my basement, where the flip of an electrical switch has just set off a funnel cloud into approximately 10-15 gallons of “water.” - I, the successful plumber, have just emptied two kitchen sinks of goop, swirling, ah swirling down the now unclogged pipes while I run even more clean water down. Finished, I turn off the disposal, replace the drain trap, empty the bucket, and welcome home my wife. - In between, and for hours afterwards, I discuss with Matt how much force 10-15 gallons of gunk must have generated in order to spray out of the drain trap over the entire wash area and work space of my basement. We also ascertain that he will watch THE BOY while I struggle both with keeping down my lunch (My what an interesting smell I’ve discovered) and scrubbing black water off of and out of every surface of the basement. And finally, when finished, running 5 loads of laundry to include small rugs, every washcloth in the house, various towels, two sets of clothes, and well, maybe you get the picture. And so ends my story. I hope yours eventually ends well too.

Re: Might be too long...formatting sucks...

[kaffy_r]

*hands you The Internetz because of your Surfeit of Awesome.*

*then dies larfing*

[mack-the-spoon.livejournal.com]

Hugs. What a hugely unpleasant and stressful situation - I hope it's well on the way to being resolved by this point.* I'd probably have had some kind of nervous breakdown by this point, so congratulations on surviving.

*Completely resolved, not to reoccur, of course.

[kaffy_r]

Thank you, my dear! I have no doubt that we all shall survive. With clothespins on our noses, mayhap, but what's plumbing without that kind of little insult to the nasal passages, eh?

[othermewriter.livejournal.com]

*huggles* sorry dear wish I could help I really hate that smell. Rather it be you then me but prefer it to be no one at all. *slaps up side the head ex-plumbers - IDIOTS!*

[kaffy_r]

The thoughts are much appreciated, no matter what. Especially slapping the first set of idiots upside the haid. Heh.