It's Always Something

Sunday evening Simon and I were watching tv when we heard a POP and a loud WHOOSHING noise come from the half-bath just off the living room. We ran over to the bathroom to find water spraying up from the floor all over the room, which was already more than an inch under water. Simon faced the intense spray and found the problem, the in-line going to the toilet tank had sprung a leak right at the gasket attaching the line to toilet. So, we shut off the water, swabbed up the gallons and gallons of water (repeatedly shoving a curious kitty out of the way who was seriously worried about his litter box floating away) and then put a sign on the toilet "Out of Order." Given that it was a Sunday and just before one of the busiest weeks of the year, we decided to put off dealing with plumbers for a while. "Good thing it didn't happen while we were asleep!" I said. Whew! Just imagine what a disaster THAT would have been. Well, we didn't have to strain our imagination capacities for long, as this morning, about 6 am when it is pitch black out, Simon got out of bed to find the upstairs bathroom had flooded (because the toilet up there had sprung a leak), the water had seeped through the floor into the kitchen, which was completely flooded and water had both run down the stairs into the basement as well as seeped through the floor into the washer/dryer room and flooded that room. So, we shut off the water to yet another bathroom (and how long before the basement toilet would explode, spraying water all over the place?) and began sopping up the worst of it. Amazingly, a plumber was able to get out this morning and fixed the half-bath toilet in a jiff but was completely at a loss as to what caused the problem upstairs: no broken pipes, no cracked gaskets, no rotten seals...nothing whatsoever was wrong with the toilet. Their advice? Shut off the water line after every use--CERTAINLY whenever we leave the house for even the shortest trip. Great. Just great. This is not a picture of a baggy backside but of our ceiling, saggy from water damage and still creaking and groaning under the weight of water retention. So add "hire someone to plaster new kitchen ceiling" on our list of Things To Do.