Late Saturday afternoon, we were getting ready to head out of town to go to dinner, do a little shopping, and probably catch a movie. We were both upstairs getting dressed, doing hair, and makeup (well, Austin wasn't doing makeup), brushing our teeth and using the restroom. We were clearly very bored and in need of an emergency activity.
We were laughing and joking heading down the stairs, and then it hit us - at the same instant - that horrible, unmistakeable stench . . . our sewer was backing up the floor drain in the basement!
Oh yes, now we're talking - this is what I call date night!
Thankfully the hardware store was still open, so we were able to rent a large pipe snake; however, after several hours of snaking (and enjoying the ubiquitous mess), the problem would still occur when we tested it by running fawcets and flushing toilets.
The large snake that we rented wouldn't fit down one of the smaller drain pipes, so Austin's parents came over and brought their smaller snake. But to no avail. Austin and Bryce worked for several more hours snaking, and flushing, and washing with the garden hose, and testing, but nothing seemed to make any difference.
They did determine which direction the pipes ran, and what needed to be accomplished, but finally at around 11:30, they conceded defeat and we got some supper.
The parents went home, and we watced some consolation House, but ended up falling asleep less than halfway into the first episode.
Sunday morning dawned bright and cold, and Austin was bound and determined to take care of our smelly problem. He went out to the back yard to see if there was another cleanout he could tap into. Nothing. So he came inside and hit the Internet. After much Google-ing, he came across a concoction that was billed as a "homemade Drano" - so we went to work.
We turned the hot water on full blast in both the kitchen and the downstairs bathroom. Dumped a cup of salt, a cup of vinegar, a cup of baking soda, and almost an entire bottle of dish soap down the drain. We added some bleach for good measure, then ventured down to the basement (water still running).
Once in the basement, Austin decided that we should dump some stuff directly down the sewage pipe via the cleanout. I retrieved the liquid laundry detergent and the powdered dish detergent from the main floor and Austin dumped away. And to the wonderment and delight of all involved - IT WORKED!!!!!
We're not sure which ingredient contained the magical de-clogging properties, or if it was just shooting boiling water through the pipes or the combination of everything - we didn't care! No more nasty smell, and no fear of the basement flooding full of nastiness!
Clearly, not our preferred set of activities for our weekend; however, God was good - thankfully we had a sump-pump hole right next to the drain, so at no point did we have a huge flooding problem, Austin's parents are always willing to help whenever they can, Austin can find ANYTHING on the Internet, and the problem was resolved without huge expense. Late Saturday night we were afraid we were going to have to hire somebody, or rent expensive large equipment to dig up and/or replace the length of pipe in the back yard, but we got out with the relatively small cost of renting the snake.
Life is never boring!
Happy Monday, and thanks for reading!
