goption Brian's blog

Satisfaction…

There is something very satisfying when you're snaking a drain and the standing water rushes down because you cleared the clog.

Over the last couple of days, I've been fighting some back-ups in the plumbing system at my house.  It's almost certain that I caused the problem myself - I put some leftover mashed potatoes, cooked carrots, and cooked green beans down the garbage disposal.  Right afterward while I was hand-washing some dishes (with the water running), Carole came in to report that the bathtub drain was backing up - which is never a good sign.

I grabbed my trusty 25 foot 1/4" hand snake, and started working it down the main clean-out.  I spooled out all 25 feet, but the water was still sitting there, so I got in the car to drive to Home Depot to buy a 40' snake.  (In my mind, if 40' doesn't do it, you need to call a plumber...)

On the way, Carole called to tell me that the drain was flowing, so I turned around and came home.  When I got there, the kitchen and bathtub drains were flowing well, but the front bathroom sink was totally stopped up.

My regular snake doesn't fit into the bathroom sink drain, so the next day Carole looked for one of those 3 foot Turbo Snakes at Target, with no luck.  Yesterday, I stopped at OSH and got a Turbo Snake and an 8' 1/4" auger snake, which has an end piece that fits into the bathroom sink drain.

The Turbo Snake did nothing - it's good for minor hair clogs, but not for anything serious.  I fed the 8' auger snake all the way in, and the water began draining, but very, very slowly.  I headed back to OSH and got a new 25' 1/4" snake - the kind with the orange plastic case that holds the snake.  When I got home, I cut down the head so it was small enough to fit into the bathroom sink drain.

All 25' went in, and the drain went from very, very slowly to just very slowly.  I talked it over with Carole, and we decided to let it drain until there was no standing water in the sink, and then use Liquid Plumr.  When I poured it in, the sink had stopped draining completely, so the chemicals just sat there in the sink.

Just before she went to bed for the night, Carole filled up the sink with hot water to the level of the vent, to dilute the chemicals.  This morning, we found that the sink had drained a little - it was about 2" below the level of the vent.

With nothing to lose but a little bit of time and effort, we decided to re-snake the drain. If it didn't work - and I didn't really expect it to - we would call a plumber out on Monday to fix it, expecting to pay upwards of $300 for the service.

I got about 10' in when I got that very satisfying sound of standing water rushing down the drain.  I kept going for another 3'-4' just to be sure, and then left the snake in place while I ran the hot water on full for about 10 minutes - both to make sure the drain was really open, and to help wash down any left-over debris.  I pulled the snake out, and kept the water running for another 5 minutes or so, with no backup.  Yay!

Snaking a drain is a messy business, so I had to clean the sink, the counter top, and the faucet really well.  I reinstalled the drain stopper, and it's now all back to normal.

All this before noon - it has already been a productive day - and now there's no need to further complicate an already difficult Monday by calling a plumber, waiting for him to arrive, hovering around while he works, and writing a big check.

Now that's satisfaction.

Pneumonia…

I've been feeling poorly for a few weeks, and I was finally able to get through to my general practitioner for an appointment. (Since the 3-day power outage in early December, her medical building has had continuing power problems with a distribution panel, which took out all the phones in the building as well.)

My early symptoms were mostly just a cough, that would get better or worse day to day, but seemed to be manageable with Robitussin. Early last week, though, things were getting worse, and on Tuesday I could barely breath comfortably after the smallest of efforts - one flight of stairs, or walking to my car in the parking lot at work. All along I had never had a fever. I got through to my doctor on Tuesday afternoon, and made an appointment for Thursday morning.

She gave me a good once over, and decided I had pneumonia, which matched Carole's diagnosis. To make sure, she sent me down for a blood count and a chest x-ray. She gave me a prescription for ten days of antibiotics and a rescue inhaler, along with the test orders.

The blood draw took about 5 minutes, but I had to sit in the waiting room for an hour and ten minutes for my chest x-ray. My son Jeremy works in the radiologist's IT department, but he wasn't able to pull any strings to get me served faster. I teased him about it the rest of the day.

I got a call from Dr. Liao late Tuesday afternoon - the chest x-ray showed bilateral basal interstitial opacity, which is the radiology way of saying pneumonia. She called again a little later once the blood work was ready - my white count was elevated

I started the meds right away. The inhaler instructions say to exhale fully, then breathe deeply while plunging down the inhaler body, and then hold your breath for 10 seconds. With my trachea and bronchi so inflamed, all of that was pretty difficult, but I did my best. Over the last few days each time gets better.

I'm still on bed rest, and will not be able to join my family for the trip to Big Bear Lake for the McConnell Christmas celebration. Dr. Liao said the combination of high altitude, low outside temperatures, and overheated inside temps would be very bad for my condition.

I'm still very tired still, and even minor effort will make me short of breath, but I can tell I'm getting better. Hopefully by New Years Day I'll be almost as good as new.