what's that gurgling sound?

We live in a beautiful home. At its centre (literally, the very middle - one must walk around or through it to get pretty much anywhere) - is a beautiful kitchen. It features yards of marble countertops, pull-out spice cupboards that flank the 5-burner gas range, and even a pretty little shelf for me to display my pretty little stainless steel tea and coffee accessories. There's an island in the middle that serves as a great place to drop things when we walk in the door, to spread necessities for baking, and has ample room for making our own sushi. There's a little bar sink in the island. There's a built-in garbage can under the mini sink that works perfectly for storing plastic grocery bags. On the outskirts of the kitchen is an eating bar where our boys sit on the 3 tall spinny chairs for snacks or meals when the dining room table is "otherwise occupied".

Have you seen this blog? Homeschool Ryan Gosling

Also in our kitchen are all the drawers you could possibly need or want in a kitchen. It lacks upper cabinets but we get by with all the drawers you could possibly need or want in a kitchen. We have a pull-out cupboard that holds 2 large bins for recycling storage, a big (bottom freezer) fridge that holds PZ's extensive sauce and condiment collection AND two jugs of milk - in the door alone! The superstar feature of the kitchen is the deep sink for washing dishes, and a smaller sink for rinsing ... and there's a garburator.

We were thrilled to see this (and everything else, to be sure!) convenience in our kitchen and have been careful not to put forbidden objects down to be mulched. Now and then something would get down the hole that should not be down the hole and we'd fish it out. Either we had seen it go down or when we turned the switch and something just didn't sound right. We knew not to put too much greasy stuff or egg shells down, as they can cause problems. Over the past week or so, we've noticed a gurgling sound when we run water down either the bar sink, the washing sink, the garburator, and even when the dishwasher drains. We thought something must have gotten jammed in the pipes so we had been planning to get some chemical drain clog remover. It didn't seem like something to call our landlord about right away, as he lives about 45 minutes away and we wanted to rule out the easy solutions first.

Tonight I put a load of laundry into the dryer and set it for 40 minutes. After only about 5 minutes into the cycle, we heard a loud clunk followed by an extended "end of cycle" buzzer. I went to check it out and found the dryer to be extra hot. We'd had a few problems with the dryer a while back that turned out to be a venting issue in the attic. That problem was somewhat resolved, though not to the extent it would have been if we were the homeowners. This time, however, the dryer would not start up again. We let it cool off, reset the cycle, tried again - nothing. It's an older model dryer that came with the house so it's not a complete surprise that it may have dried its last load.

It was early enough to call the landlord to let him know the machine needed some attention. They weren't home so Paul left a message. Then he decided to go down into the unfinished basement to see if there might be something wrong with the electrical breaker panel. He opened the door and fumbled for the light switch ... and nearly fell flat because of a very slippery concrete floor. Then he noticed the smell. Not quite like barf, but pretty close. Turning on the lights, he saw ...

... an obvious case of "something's not right with the pipes"! He could see right away that it was a back-up issue, but couldn't do any trouble-shooting of the problem with all the mess. Nasty drain and garburator water had somehow filled this huge double basin and had spouted out of an air venting drain. He called the landlord yet again, leaving a more detailed and urgent message than the one about the drier. Landlord called back this time, mostly to confirm it wasn't an issue of the sewer backing up, and to say that he'd be coming out here tomorrow to assess everything. Paul went out to camp to get the heavy duty wet vacuum and got to work cleaning the mess. Once that was done, he was able to have a go at what might have caused the problem. He opened a valve here and loosened some things there, sucked a bunch of stuff out of the pipe. He had me do some tests of running water upstairs to see where it was going and where it might be getting clogged. After a bit more digging he found the culprit. Are you ready?

A toothpick! One measly little toothpick had slipped down the drain, only to get caught horizontally across a narrow point in the drain pipe. On top of the toothpick was a nice little plug of coleslaw resting on top of it. Unreal, hey? Once that was cleared out and everything put back together, everything drained nicely, just as it should.

So as not to end this post on such a nasty note - I leave you with some lovely reminders that SPRING is here!