Weekend Refugees

On Friday night I was doing the dishes when I realized my sink was backing up.  I found that if I ran the disposal it went back down.  I continued this routine until all the dishes were finished.  That's when I heard dripping.  I opened up the cabinet underneath to find that the whole disposal was leaking and there was an inch of water underneath.  "GREAT!" I thought.

That's when I heard Jeff yell my name.  I looked down the stairs to see his arm wet.  "What is that from?" I asked.  Well, THAT was from our utility sink in the basement overflowing all over our back room.  I had run a load of laundry and as it drained into the sink, the sink was also backing up.   Turns out our pipes, which back up every few months, may have gotten worse.  Yay for old houses!

Now, the flood itself could have been A LOT worse, but to us it felt like this:

We immediately stopped all water activities for the evening and spent the rest of the time, soaking up, mopping, and cleaning the mess.

We were able to get in touch with our landlord the next day.  The only problem was that she wasn't able to get a plumber out until Monday at noon (it was Saturday AM).  There was no way we could spend a whole weekend without being able to use any of our plumbing except the bathroom. 

Washing dishes in our dingy old bathroom sink or tub? Bleh!

What to do, what to do....

That's when we remembered that my in-laws were going to be away on a cruise for the week.  Jeff got on the phone to try to catch them before they got on the ship.  We lucked out and got them.  They were more than happy to let us stay at their house for the weekend and we were very grateful.  We packed up the kids, the dog, and some stuff and we were off like a bunch of refugees escaping our homeland.

When we got to their clean, non-cluttered, non-leaking house, Jeff and I felt like we were here:

Ok, maybe I'm being a little dramatic, but after leaving our mess, it did seem a bit like this.

It was nice to be away on our mini-vacay, but alas it was finally time to head home.  We packed up the kids, the dog, and our stuff and were off to return to our motherland.  Upon return, we found that the downstair's sink was still backed up, but at least the house was dry.  Phew!

We are now waiting for the plumber to come today and let us know just how bad the plumbing is.  Trying to look on the bright side, we don't own this home so we don't have to pay for repairs.

However, this event did make us realize just how badly we would like to get out of this rental and finally get back into owning our own home. (Preferably a less beat up one.)  We can see the light at the end of the tunnel and this spring may be the time when we can make it happen. 

Waiting ever so patiently....