Frank vs the plumbing

[fbhjr]

Our spare bathroom doesn’t get used as much as the one off our bedroom for obvious reasons.
With Luthor moving in Sunday evening my wife wanted to test the shower that morning.
It wouldn’t turn on. So, she called me.
I got it to turn on, but couldn’t get it to turn off. To turn it on, I had pulled so hard that the handle cracked.
I took it off an tried to close it using some vice grips on the stem. I still couldn’t quite manage it.
My wife had another go, and she did manage to get it to stop.

We hate having plumbers in to fix things in our apartment. I’ll grant you, our apartment is very full and quite messy. The plumber when he comes in complains about this to the owner of the complex. Not the manager, but the actual owner who, as far as I know, has never even seen the complex. (The owner owns three different complexes here in town and to the best of my knowledge has never visited any of them.)
Last time this happened it involved a lot of tense notes about our lease, proper storage of things and inspections by the manager.
Don’t want to go through that again.

On the way to sword practice, I stopped and got a “universal tub knob” kit.
When we got home, I applied this kit and found it to be less than entirely universal.
Either the screws were too long or the spacer they give you for it was too short. But the screws could not reach to where they needed to attach either way.
Being a Sunday night on a 3 day weekend, I decided to try and shorten the spacer instead of lengthen the screws. (Lengthening the screws would involve going to the hardware store and buying longer ones.)

Using a tree branch saw and some vice grips I managed to saw an quarter of an inch (6mm) off the end of the spacer.
I only cut a little bit of my thumb in the process…

But, the spare bathroom shower now works. Just as well. I don’t want Luthor trampling through our room to use our shower.

Everyone seems to think the cut on my thumb comes from sword fighting. I guess that is more cool than holding a plastic spacer over a garbage can with vice grips while sawing it with a tree saw in your other hand. Right?

Comments

[ravena-kade.livejournal.com]

Having re grouted my own bathroom, I think home repair injuries are cool =)

[brickhousewench.livejournal.com]

Hey, scars are scars. You get to make up stories about how you got them.

[palusbuteo.livejournal.com]

we'll have to create an addition to Mair after Sickle and Scythe to include Hack Saw

[endlessblush.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you got the shower fixed - the last thing you want is for your guest to be trampling through your room to get to the bathroom. YOu all need your personal space.

[pallid-regina.livejournal.com]

You're a bathroom hero.

[uawildcatgrl.livejournal.com]

We have a similar problem...though ours is more that the plumber our landlord hires is a complete ass and I don't want him in my house for even a nanosecond (last time he was there he was incredibly nasty and rude) so when our toilet handle broke three weeks ago...Jeff fixed it...it did require 2 trips to home depot for appropriate tools and because of our work schedules took a week to fix...but it's fixed! (It's a second bathroom, we were not without)

[evrgreen.livejournal.com]

Plumbing is like your own personal kryptonite, isn't it?

Glad that you got it all working - as the old proverb goes, house guests and fish both begin to go bad after 3 days, and there is no need to add malodorous to the mix!

[cissa.livejournal.com]

Your flat is SO much neater than our house! Just sayin'.