Yellowstone National Lawn

Wifezilla and I bought our house back in '99. It was our first house and we were naturally excited. Up until then, we had been apartment dwellers. When something went wrong, you called the building and they fixed it. I had no fixer-upper skills and no reason to develop any. Something goes wrong with your house, and you call yourself and you fix it. Or some smelly, toothless dude billing you $30 an hour.

So I found myself waaaay over my head when I found the house's sprinkler system riddled with leaks. They didn't appear at first, only after a couple hours of watering. And then one day I aerated the yard and punched a whole right into one of the pipes. Water shot out a spectacular two feet into the air and then bubbled like a pretty fountain. We had our very own Old Faithful.

I actually rolled up my sleeves and fixed the leaks. It was a horrible experience. First, you have to dig the hole. Not just down to the pipe, but under it as well. After you shut the main water line down, you have to cut the section of the pipe with the leak, about an inch to an inch-and-a-half. Then you run to Home Depot and buy a coupling, a two-inch piece of pvc pipe that will fit pipe on either end. You also pick up some pvc glue. This stuff, when applied to pvc, fuses piping together rather than just sticking so it's more like acid than glue. You glop some of that glue inside both ends of the coupling, you pop the coupling into the missing cut section, you let it dry for a good long while, and then you turn the water on and pray to Jesus that water doesn't come shooting out.

Actually, my first attempt witnessed a fine mist spraying out one side of the coupling; I had to re-cut and do the whole thing over. My second attempt stuck though. I was one tired but proud fixer-upper.

That was probably eight years ago and I haven't had any plumbing problems since. Till yesterday. Backing out of my driveway to pick Hallie up from Girl Scouts, I noticed one section of my sidewalk wet. It hasn't rained in days and I haven't watered in months. It's dark by the time we get back but I grab a flashlight and investigate. Sure enough, a tiny section of grass is swampy with too much water. I check my curb-side water meter and it's spinning slowly despite the fact that no water is running inside our outside the house.

My next door neighbor drives up at this time and guesses what I'm doing. This guy is in the middle of remodeling his house. And I mean HE is remodeling his house, turning the attic into livable space himself. This guy can't park his truck in his garage because it's full of power tools and gadgets, many of which I can only guess their purpose. Every weekend he's sawing, measuring, nailing, or gluing something. In other words, he's my complete antithesis. David chuckled at my dilemma and then kindly offered to help me fix it this afternoon. He's even got all the supplies! With a little luck, we can have it fixed by dinner time.