The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

Let me review the previous episode of Plumbing Hell in case some of you missed it, ignored it or, like me, probably tried to forget it. We had a leak in the upstairs bathroom’s sink, enough to run down through the ceiling into the basement bathroom. No big deal, you’re probably thinking, but if that’s what you were thinking, then I know you are the type of person who dials his cellphone for the closest plumber to come out and fix the problem. For us on the South End, that has never been an option. The trip out and back costs more than whatever was wrong in the first place.

No, we do what our predecessors here in the nettle jungles of the backwash have always done. We shudder, we perspire, we break into palpitations and finally, after an appropriate procrastination, we take a good hard belt straight from the whisky bottle and without bothering to wipe our chins, we bore in. Tools come out, the cursing starts, the whimpering follows. If you recall, I had no more begun to work on that sink when an obstinate inlet valve snapped off the hot water line, spewing 40 gallons of a fast draining hot water heater onto the floor until I finally got a bucket or actually two under the floodwaters.

Yesterday I reassembled the entire kit and caboodle, what we semi-professional plumbers refer to as the ‘whole shitaree’. Got the valve on okay, lifted the hundred pound century old pedestal sink into position, got the drain pipes reassembled and voila, turned on the taps. And yeah, the same stupid leak was still there. Plus a new one. Sure, I cursed, I cast blame near and far, I wept. But … I knew this was the probable, not the possible, outcome. Plumbing is not a one step venture. It is a journey of a thousand miserable steps.

I’m not going to bore you with a litany of what followed; suffice it to say, the procedure was reversed, more parts were disassembled and since they are a century old, small washer screws inside the brass faucets crumbled and had to be drilled out. Of course the screw threads had dissolved with time too. An experienced hand at plumbing like myself, KNOWS this will happen. It’s why he didn’t replace them the last time even though they were leaking then. This time, however, I dared to tread where others dread, a motto I may copyright for when I incorporate my plumbing bizness.

I’m into the third day, three or four trips to the hardware store, and no, I haven’t rehooked up the water yet. What’s the rush? The mizzus is out of town galavanting in New Orleans, so what if I have company coming in two days. Plenty of time for a pro to make the necessary repairs, clean up the damage, put away the tools and pretend that all is well in the homeland. Picture of idyllic rural living, eh? If things don’t go well, and you and I both know it’s looking iffy as of this moment, the guests can do what I do, wash their hands in the bathtub, brush their teeth over the toilet. At least I’m not making them use the outhouse.

We just got back from the American Outback, ready for the dreaded Chores with happy hearts, exactly what a vacation is supposed to do for ya. But life is always full of those surprises that are meant to provide an extra helping or two of Humble Pie. So we woke to find a puddle of water on the downstairs bathroom floor. After mowing some lawn I went in the upstairs bath to do the dreaded troubleshooting. I am very very familiar with the sadistic tendencies of the plumbing gods and I do not trespass lightly on their turf, not with the scars I could offer up as proof of their capricious cruelty.

No sir, I intended to proceed with Utmost Caution! The leak, it was determined by my vast experience in matters household hydrologic, was in a recessed cranny up under the pedestal sink where only hobo spiders dared lurk. I tried tightening the nut up in there, but you know and I did too, that would be far Too Easy. I sensed a trap, no fool I. Ignoring any obvious warning signs, I began to disassemble drainpipe, cabinetry, any impediment to providing clearance to that obstinate brass nut. The first water inlet valve uncoupled with some considerable effort — the second, the hot water, wouldn’t budge. A bit more force, I deduced … and snapped the half inch CPVC plastic pipe right off the wall. Hot water shot out in a 5 gallon per minute stream. I reacted with alacrity and stuck a finger in the gaping wound, the Dutch Boy Dike Strategem.

Only … how long could I wait? The Dutch Kid had a town to come and help. I had old age and slow starvation before help arrived. I pulled the plug, my finger, and raced to the basement shutoff, knowing the water was spewing freely upstairs. Got back up and no let up, just the hot water tank emptying its 40 gallons. I grabbed buckets, I threw down towels, I offered my first born to these plumbing gods, I swore, I emptied pail after pail and squeezed towel after sopping towel.

When it finished disgorging the tank, I was totally soaked, the bathrooms were swimming pools, the gas hot water heater was heating air. I finally shut off the gas, not sure if this would ruin it heating without water.

As I write this, the pedestal sink sits in the middle of the room while I’m mowing my little park across the island. I’m drinking a beer before the next grassy section along the highway. I’ve learned these things, plumbing, I mean, they take time. Lots of time. I’m sure glad to be home. You know … if I decide to return.

The Fender Bender Repair Shop hides down past Tyee Store’s huge footprint, mostly just a pole building with four stalls, one with a hydraulic lift over a three foot pit. Ben Paulsen started it then years ago as an auto repair business to replace the income he lost when the tool and die shop he’d worked at twenty years closed down during the Great Recession. Ben used his 401-K savings to buy the dilapidated metal shed and lost a fortune on the penalties for cashing in early.

“How’s Biz?” I asked when I drove up with my truck that needed a new clutch. Ben groaned and said sadly, “You’re it, that’s how business is lately.” Most days Ben and a few layabout cronies can be found in an upstairs office with large windows overlooking the empty bays, television on with Fox News yammering in the background and a refrigerator full of barely cold beer the boys haul in but never take out. If Benny’s making money, it pretty much goes into the fridge and cable. Us locals know to make our appointments in the morning before the noon Happy Hour if we want quality repairs. Late afternoon, we might as well do them ourselves, just as bad but far cheaper.

“Whatcha got for me, Skeeter?” Ben finally asked. I told him my clutch was starting to slip. “All right, lemme order a new one, get it tomorrow. That okay?” I said it was and asked if I needed an appointment. Ben cast an arm out over the barren bays. “I think you’ll be first in line.” He dug his grease fissured hands into his ancient overalls. “Trump don’t bring those jobs back soon, this place is toast,” he lamented forlornly. I didn’t have the heart to argue with him.

“I’ll see you morning after next,” I said and got back in my old pickup, started it and backed up. Ben stood watching, then turned and headed back up the stairs. Fox News was flickering through the big windows. The Fender Bender Repair sign, bordered by small theater lights, flickered too. In Ben’s mind, the whole damn country was doing the same.

I got a knee that’s been bothering me. For about three years. I finally figured it wasn’t going to heal up so I went to my local clinic, got a checkup and was sent into town for some X-rays, then back to the original doc who took ten minutes before we both came to the same diagnosis: I was NOT Fred with the bad wrist. When we finally got Skeeter’s medical file, he told me he didn’t see anything particularly wrong, no doubt scribbling in my chart after I left — HYPOCHONDRIA.

A year later and no improvement in that knee, I switched clinics and tried again, this time asking the attending physician for an MRI, which he scheduled along with more X-rays. The MRI, I was certain, would show him the cause of my knee pain, hopefully something easily repaired. When I scheduled my consultation after the MRI came back and my answering machine mentioned ‘torn cruciate ligament’ I was confident we were going to get to the root of my chronic problem. At last!

My next doc mentioned he hadn’t had time to read my MRI’s yet, but he took a moment to have a look. “I see some arthritis in that left knee,” he told me and I told him my problem was in the right knee. “Not much arthritis there,” he said after studying the photos, “but that must be it.” (I’m sure he underlined the aforementioned HYPOCHONDRIAC in red ink.)

“I know I’m shy a few credits on my medical degree,” I protested, “but it sure feels like something’s wrong in there. A tear maybe?”

He patiently explained he was an osteo-surgeon and if I wanted a knee replacement, he was my man. “Whoa,” I said, “I’m not shopping knees today, I just want to figure out what this problem is.”

Disappointed, I went home, back to Plan A — see if it would heal itself. A month later my brother asked how the MRI’s turned out. When I told him, he said let’s look at your charts (his wife is an RN) and when I told him I hadn’t seen them, he explained it was almost two decades into the 21st Century, they would be available On-line, let’s have a look, so we did and right there in black and white on the MRI report were my two ligament tears, anterior cruciate and posterior too.

That was three months ago. I know I should go back, get a 3rd opinion, see if this knee can be repaired. My trouble is, I figure 50/50 they’ll amputate the leg. Probably the left one. So for the time being, I’m sticking with Plan A. Seems a helluva lot safer bet.

Maybe you’ve heard recently about the 40,000 acre data center just approved in Utah. Sure, it’s huge, a black hole going to suck water and power for Northern Utah. If you’re like me, data centers and the protests against them are fairly new to my radar. When I searched, probably with unasked for AI assist that seems to be ubiquitous now, I discovered there are over 5000 data centers in this country, more than the total of the next top ten combined, ten times more than the closest two, Germany and the UK who each have a little more than 500. China, in case you were wondering, was next with over 400.

How is it we missed these things? Well, for one thing, they’re being built in primarily rural areas, places that might think jobs are coming to save the day. And maybe didn’t realize the amount of water and power they’ll be consuming. Their water and power that will soon cost a helluva lot more than before the Center went online. Lately, tho, the public is waking up, if belatedly, to the proliferation of these things. AI is here and where did we think all that computation was being done?

Utah is, or at least was, trying to conserve water. The Great Salt Lake is drying up after years of drought. But 3 county commissioners approved the application anyway. When two podcasters threw themselves into the scrimmage, those commissioners accused them of being spies for the Chinese. No doubt the People’s Republic has plenty of espionage teams in the Mormon State, keeping an eye on polygamy maybe.

It looks like this genie is definitely out of its bottle. AI has seeped into our everyday lives without most of us noticing. College and high school students use it for a little more than research. Forget Cliff Notes, they can pop out a research paper in less than a minute. Amazon just limited the number of new books by any one author to three. A day! Writer’s block? I don’t think so. One musician I read about in this morning’s fake news had 7 albums out this year already. He was not one bit or byte embarrassed to let us know he used AI. Just another tool in the box.

It’s a brave new world. Just not our world anymore….