Come Darkness, Come Light (Mary Chapin Carpenter)

My horoscope for yesterday:

Bureaucracy and paperwork are your worst enemies today, but that doesn't mean you should avoid them! Just try to make sure you don't get stuck within the system for long -- or you might crack.

and today's:

It's hard to figure out what to do next -- there are so many options to choose from! Try not to worry about it too much, because things should be a lot clearer for you in a few more days.

I'm thinking that three plumbing posts are already two too many... but figured I'd give an update before I moved on - Al did indeed show up yesterday morning... and, after taking out the toilet in the master bathroom, jackhammered exactly where the Leak Detector Guy said the leak was... and... nothing. Al now thinks the leak is a bit to the right... which would mean under the vanity, requiring more demolition... but he really can't do anything until the LDG comes back out to re-survey - I of course called the LDG (Kenny) to see if that could be yesterday afternoon.

Heard back from him a few hours later that he was at his father's funeral (you just can't make this sh*t up) - after sincerely telling him he was in my thoughts and prayers, I gave it up for the weekend, knowing we will resume Monday morning. Yes, I have metaphorically passed the plumbing problem baton on to my was-on-a-business-trip-last-week-to-Mexico husband - he got home late last night, saw the sheer exhaustion and frustration in my face and body language (even after I'd soaked in the jacuzzi last night)... and suggested we check into a hotel for the weekend. Loved the idea... but, of course with all this going on, my immune system seems to be down and I've caught a cold... so it felt like a waste of money - I made it clear I'd love to take a raincheck... :-)

However, I had a few obligations on the calendar that I have since erased, making it an event-free weekend (take a picture!) - I do not plan to go anywhere for 48 hours. When the going gets tough, the tough make soup... a sh*tpot, as we call it in the South (me having grown up and lived in the Atlanta area, until I moved to South Florida 16 years ago) - I spent the last few hours in my kitchen, chopping up all varieties of my food co-op organic vegetables for inclusion in a chicken broth stock: green beans, carrots, zucchini, corn off the cob, onions... and adding brown rice and sauteed chicken and the right amount/type of spices. I am sitting here at the keyboard with a steaming cup, stopping every few sentences to take a spoonful, inhale the aroma and appreciate the fresh taste, feeling my sinuses open and my cold symptoms dissipate - I already feel better... but I'm still not leaving the house!

Of course, the first item on the Soup-Making To Do List is which CD to put on to accompany - I bought Mary Chapin Carpenter's new holiday CD, Come Darkness, Come Light a few weeks ago on the September 30 release date and have listened to it in my car quite a few times. It's absolutely stunning, very mellow and instrospective, a good balance of originals and not, but even the covers are obscure - this recording may end up tied with The Roches' We Three Kings as my favorite for the season.

More from MCC's website here (make sure you click Next to read all 4 pages)...

SONG(S): Come Darkness, Come Light by Mary Chapin Carpenter (lyrics as yet unavailable, but song samples can be heard here)...

Times Three by Christine Kane (for Catherine: I watched back-to-back-to-back episodes of What Not to Wear last night - does that count?... :-)

BOOK: Peace Soup : The Recipe for a Peaceful Life in the New Millennium by Chef Jerry Bartholow

POEM: The Way In by Linda Hogan

Sometimes the way to milk and honey is through the body.
Sometimes the way in is a song.
But there are three ways in the world: dangerous, wounding,
and beauty.
To enter stone, be water.
To rise through hard earth, be plant
desiring sunlight, believing in water.
To enter fire, be dry.
To enter life, be food.

QUOTE: "Soup and fish explain half the emotions of human life." ~ Sydney Smith

You Can Call Me Al (Paul Simon)

I almost used Eve of Destruction as the title of this blog post... but Paul Simon's tune is so much more snappy and upbeat - plus... the plumber just left after having given me the estimate, and I am continuing to think positive.

At this point, we have two options: jackhammer the bathroom floor tiles, and possibly remove the toilet, in the area of the leak - I have asked, and they agreed, to keep the extent of the damage as small as possible, although whatever needs to be done will be done. I actually found a box of extra floor tiles in the attic and maybe, just maybe, those broken up can be replaced - as I've said before, I am open to the idea of re-doing the entire floor (I just prefer not to!).

Second option: re-routing the pipe from the hot water heater through the attic down the wall to the bathroom, at which point there would still have to be tiles torn up - this procedure would require two people (so the price would double)... plus materials.

Call me crazy... but I can't imagine choosing Option #2 when #1 sounds so straightforward and simple, not to mention less expensive - I don't want to operate on fear (the same pipe will break in another location), so I'm choosing to believe in isolating the problem, feeling sure that direct and minimal will do the trick.

My plumber's name is Al... not Joe (thanks, Catherine, for the hysterical comment in my previous post) - for the record, no one in this equation makes $250,000 a year or more... :-)

SONG: You Can Call Me Al by Paul Simon

BOOK: Flushed: How the Plumber Saved Civilization by W. Hodding Carter

POEM: Elegy for Alfred Hubbard by Tony Connor

Hubbard is dead, the old plumber:
who will mend our burst pipes now,
the tap that has dripped all the summer,
testing the sink's overflow?

No other like him. Young men with knowledge
of new techniques and theories from books
may better his work, straight from college,
but who will challenge his squint-eyed looks

in kitchen, bathroom, under floorboards,
rules of thumb which were often wrong;
seek as erringly stopcocks in cupboards,
or make a job last half as long?

He was a man who knew the ginnels
alleyways, streets — the whole district:
family secrets, minor annals,
time-honoured fictions fused to fact.

Seventy years of gossip muttered
under his cap, his tufty thatch,
so that his talk was slow and clotted,
hard to follow, and too much.

As though nothing fell, none vanished,
and time were the maze of Cheetham Hill,
in which the dead — with jobs unfinished
waited to hear him ring the bell.

For much he never got round to doing,
but meant to, when weather bucked up,
or worsened, or when his pipe was drawing,
or when he'd finished this cup.

I thought time, he forgot so often,
had forgotten him; but here's Death's pomp
over his house, and by the coffin
the son who will inherit his blowlamp,

tools, workshop, cart, and cornet
(pride of Cheetham Prize Brass Band),
and there's his mourning widow, Janet,
stood at the gate he'd promised to mend.

Soon he will make his final journey:
shaved and silent, strangely trim,
with never a pause to talk to any-
body: how arrow-like, for him!

In St Mark's Church, whose dismal tower
he pointed and painted when a lad,
they will sing his praises amidst flowers
while, somewhere, a cellar starts to flood,

and the housewife banging his front-door knocker
is not surprised to find him gone,
and runs for Thwaite, who's a better worker,
and sticks at a job until it's done.

QUOTE: "Modern cynics and skeptics... see no harm in paying those to whom they entrust the minds of their children a smaller wage than is paid to those to whom they entrust the care of their plumbing." ~ John F. Kennedy

Flood (Annie Gallup)

When I got home from work last night about 7 p.m. (after stopping by the food co-op to pick up my order), as soon as I walked in the door I heard the sound of water rushing (almost like a running toilet) - I went around the house, trying to isolate the noise, but couldn't (meaning it was either under the house or behind the walls). Fortunately, I know how to turn off the water to the house, which I did, and the sound stopped - unfortunately, my husband's out of town (something major... appliance/car/home... always breaks when he's gone!).

I called the plumber at 7 this morning, and they made me first appointment of the day (somewhere between 8:30 and 9 a.m.) - he showed up right on time, and isolated the problem to be in the hot water system. He turned off the hot water heater, so at least we can use the water now (as opposed to last night when I had to turn everything off) - they can't do anything to fix it until they know exactly where the leak is... so he recommended a leak detection company.

I called and they can come out tomorrow (Wednesday) between 10 and noon - once they locate the leak, it gets turned back over to the plumber and they will have to go in through the walls or under the floor to repair or reroute the pipes.

I am sick to my stomach over the potential extent and expense of the problem - all I can visualize is jackhammers demolishing my floors/walls!

Think positive thoughts, please - in the meantime, I'll be showering in the pool or the jacuzzi... :-)

SONG: Flood by Annie Gallup

BOOK: The Plumber's Troubleshooting Guide by R. Dodge Woodson

POEM: blessing the boats by Lucille Clifton

(at St. Mary's)

may the tide
that is entering even now
the lip of our understanding
carry you out
beyond the face of fear
may you kiss
the wind then turn from it
certain that it will
love your back may you
open your eyes to water
water waving forever
and may you in your innocence
sail through this to that

QUOTE: "You could write the story of man's growth in terms of his epic concerns with water." ~ Bernard Frank