… and it’s only 6pm.
What I was planning to do, after finishing my post this morning, was get a couple of hours a sleep in before my younger daughter and I headed out for errands.
Then my husband asked me if we had an extra box fan somewhere, because his just stopped working.
I remembered that we had one in the new basement that would normally be set up in the old basement window. We haven’t had to do that yet, this summer, so I was going to go get it. I was next to the door to the old basement, so I was going to go through that way to get it.
I didn’t make it all the way down the stairs, when I had to go back up and get my rubber boots.
Our septic was backing up the floor drain.
Now, on the plus side, it was just toilet paper, really. There was enough of it, however, to actually lift the floor drain cover up.
Once booted and gloved up, I opened the access pipe. It, thankfully, was not full of TP. So some water was still getting through, somewhere.
Thanks to the commercial drain auger we have, I was able to punch through the clog – right at the bottleneck, of course, – and get things draining. I didn’t even have to turn on the motor, and just used the drain snake. It’s rigid enough that I could push it through manually – and I could tell immediately when I got through, as what standing water there was, flowed away. I took the hose and ran water through the length of the pipe and into the tank, and nothing backed up. The septic pump did turn on, though, which was a good sign.
Nothing from the floor drain, though.
For that, I had to manually remove as much as I could into a garbage can. It wasn’t actually a lot, once I saw it together in one spot, but enough to be an issue for the size of pipe.
Once I got the bulk of it out, things started to flow and I could use the hose in the access pipe, flushing it back to the weeping tile under the new basement as well.
Then it was time to clean up the floor.
So that was a big, messy job though, thankfully, not as gross as it could have been!
While the water was flowing freely again, we did need to empty the tank. We normally would have done it in early spring, but too many other things messed up our budget. I was really hoping we could last until fall. When pushing the drain auger and the hose all the way through into the tank, I could feel how full it was. So, once I was done and cleaned up, I called the septic company and left a message.
He called back almost immediately.
He will be coming out tomorrow morning.
On updating the family – and assuring them that yes, we can use the toilet! – and telling them I’d have to take cash out from another budget, my older daughter came to the rescue, and transferred over enough to cover the bill. Including tip!
She was still on for getting Chinese food for my birthday, too.
What I think we need is to replace our entire toilet. We’ve already replaced the riser, but it just doesn’t hold a lot of water. The tank is lined, so there isn’t as much there, but there’s also very little in the bowl, even though I’ve set the dial on the riser to max. Meanwhile, there is some sort of leak in the overflow pipe, and we would have phantom flush, unless I allowed the refill hose to fill the tank directly, instead of through the overflow pipe. As a bonus, the tank would actually refill quickly, instead of taking forever.
There are other issues with the toilet, like no shut off valve, but I really like it. The bowl is 18 inches high, instead of the standard 16.5, so it is much better on the knees and back. My daughter and I did some searching and we found a 17″ one that has smooth sides under the bowl, so it’s easier to clean. That’s what we would replace it with, if we could. Price after taxes, though, would be heading towards $400. So that’s not going to happen any time soon!
Speaking of the price of things…
I got the estimate for replacing the door and frame in the entryway.
*sigh*
Over $4100, after labour and taxes.
The problem isn’t the pre-hung door. Even taking into account we are getting a more expensive one, with a window that can be opened. It’s the stucco. To remove the old frame, they’ll have to cut through the stucco to get it out. Then, once they’ve measured with the new frame, cut more stucco to size before installation can be done. Then they’ll hopefully be able to install the old storm door. This is not going to be a quick and easy job.
The estimate even says that, while they’ll try to be as careful as possible, there may be issues with the stucco breaking up, so if they have to repair that, it would be an additional cost.
That’s more than double what I though the cost might be. With how much it’s going to cost when the truck gets worked on through our insurance claim, plus so many other things sucking away at any emergency funds we had, we simply don’t have it. We might have to have another talk with the bank and try to come up with something.
When I told my mother that the door and frame needed replacing and why, she had asked me to let her know how much it cost. She would help.
There’s no way she’ll be doing that with the bill this high. Talking to my younger daughter about it and mentioning what my mom had said, she just laughed out loud. As she put it, that kind of money is “vandal” money, not “us” money. Our vandal would go to her for money, constantly, and she almost always gave in, and often more than the amount of this estimate. But to help us or my brother? Nope.
I don’t know what we’re doing to do, but we have 30 days to accept the estimate. After that, they have to do another estimate. Also, 1/3rd needs to be paid up front, before they start.
So that was another downer.
Things got better after that, though, as my daughter and I headed out…
Not without interruption.
Our phones started going off with emergency alerts. Due to wild wires, our province has again declared a province wide state of emergency. Evacuation orders are in effect in some of the reserves up north. Nothing in our area, though, so we are all right where we are. After pausing to check the fire maps, we continued on.
Our first stop was the post office, to get her birthday present: a new cane. My husband had ordered one, months ago, and it never arrived because the delivery company messed up. After giving on on that order, my husband and daughter went looking, and found this for her.
It is a Kommando Tactical Survival Hammer.
It’s also not a pretend novelty item. This thing is solid and functional.
Most importantly, it is a very comfortable cane for my daughter.
She thinks it’s absolutely hilarious, and she loves it! She started using it right away, and hasn’t stopped.
Cane acquired, it was off to town. First stop was the Chinese restaurant. My daughter went in to place the order, and then we were going to the grocery store while it was being made.
My daughter forgot her wallet.
We decided we could drive back to get it, giving the restaurant an estimated time it would take us, and then off we went.
Into rain with drops so big, I thought they were hail!
Sadly, no rain reached our place.
We got home, my daughter dashed in, and we were off again. Just in time for the food to be ready for pick up!
As I was catching up to my daughter in the parking lot, my phone began to ring.
It was home care.
*sigh*
Thankfully, they weren’t calling about tonight, but for tomorrow morning. Which worked out, actually, as I knew my mother would be needing a grocery shopping trip and probably laundry, etc. By the time I was off the phone, I was having to hold the doors open for my daughter, with the food!
That done, we stopped at the grocery store to pick up a few things on their list – including a cake for me!
Thankfully, I remembered to go to a bank machine before we left town, so we would have cash for the septic guy tomorrow. I’ll be at my mother’s before he gets here, so I’ll be leaving the gate open, and have the cash ready for whoever is available at home to pay him, then make sure the gate is closed, afterwards. With how or vandal has been behaving, none of us feel we can leave the gate open for long.
That done, we could finally head home! Once everything was unloaded at the house, I started feeding kitties to get them away from the truck, so my daughter could park the truck.
She is fine with driving, which means I don’t have to reschedule my eye test next week.
There was still a lot of dry kibble out – the cats have not been eating as much, in this heat! – but I got the kitten soup out. As I was going to set the bowls out for the feral kittens, I spotted a pair of ears in the front window of the isolation shelter. Someone was in the hammock, but was so small, only the ear tips were visible!
It turned out to be Grommet.
Which means Grommet got the biggest bowl of kitten soup, all to himself!
That done, I left the girls to get things organized and called my mother about tomorrow. When I said I got a call from home care and that I would be coming in tomorrow morning, she started to get angry, but I distracted her by saying I could do her grocery shopping and laundry. It turns out she was already starting a grocery list, because her fridge is getting empty.
😄
We ended up talking for a while, and I did tell her about what our vandal has been doing. When repeating some of the things he said, even my mother was saying, how is that his business? Why does he care?
At one point, she brought up going to the police about it, and I told her I probably should, but we’ve had so much going on, it’s just really difficult. Out of curiosity, I brought up the septic backing up into the basement, which she didn’t even acknowledge years, and that we got an estimate about the door, reminding her about the front door and frame needing to be replaced. She just vaguely said that this was stuff to talk to my brother about.
Then she offered to call the police for me, herself. After all, this was happening at “her” place.
…
I told her, no. You aren’t directly involved. This is for me to do. So she left it at that.
Yeah. She’s already backed out of her offer to help with the door and frame replacement. I doubt she even remembers making it.
We ended up talking for quite a while before I could finally say goodbye and have supper. The rest of the family was already done by then! I hadn’t realized just how long the call turned out to be.
The food was delicious, as always. We got enough to feed us for a couple of days, at least! The less cooking we have to do in this heat, the better.
It’s now coming up on 8pm as I write this, and I’ll be doing my evening rounds, soon. Looking at the weather radar, we are still under severe thunderstorm alerts. There even seems to be a system heading our way that will actually pass over us, in a couple of hours. Which means rain, for a couple of hours! Maybe. 35% chance of rain.
So… do I water the garden again tonight, or leave it for the morning? We’re still at 25C/77F, humidex at 27C/81F, and we won’t be reaching comfortable temperatures until about 3am. The humidity is at 81%.
I’ll see how things look while I’m doing my checks. To be honest, I’m ready to crawl into bed right now. The heat has sucked all the energy out of me. Which is insane, because we’ve got AC now, and it’s so much better in the house than in previous years! My heat tolerance is dropping so much, as I get older.
This day has turned out to be all over the place. Tomorrow doesn’t look like it’ll be any better. While I’m at my mother’s, I’m going to miss my brother and SIL as they come out to take their trailer to somewhere else for the next while.
I need sleep.
The Re-Farmer
The Re-Farmer 