which_chick | (no subject)

It being a Monday, I went off to work. Now, admittedly, I did work things two weekends ago (frozen pipes) and I did work things this past weekend (four hours of fucking with the road to rescue the idiot contractors who'd come down to measure windows at Orpin's across the lake plus also Sunday delivering shopvac to 219 #4 for him to fix his flood issues). But those were extra-curricular things. Monday was for real work.

First things first, I had a toilet fill valve at Patty's at 136. This was a known issue, scheduled on Friday for first thing Monday. Tenant said it was "taking a really long time for toilet to fill after flushing". (This is one failure state for Fluidmasters.) When I went to shut it off, I discovered that the shutoff valve there does not work, so I shut off water for the building to put in the new fill valve. Other than that, this was a straightforward repair. I did not fix the toilet shutoff valve because that was beyond the scope of the project.

Second: Paul at TA1 had a toilet handle that didn't work and also wanted a plate for his tub. I put in a toilet handle. I put a plate in the tub. The toilet kept running, acted like a flapper. I bought a new flapper. I went to take the old one off the ears at the bottom of the overflow tube. The overflow tube shattered. Fuck. I was NOT being mean to it. For normal toilets, the overflow tube is part of the entire overflow assembly. To replace it, you have to unattach the toilet tank from the part you sit on. (The tank is held onto the for-sitting part by two bolts with nuts. The bolts are brass and will probably come undone for you.) So.

Shut off water. Flush toilet to empty tank as empty as it gets. (It never gets empty enough but do this step anyway.) Unattach supply line. Odds are good that it will dribble. Those cute little toilet shutoff valves? They fucking suck. When I am king of the world, all shutoff valves will be 1/4 turn ball valves because they SHUT THE FUCKING WATER THE FUCK OFF. When you have ball valves, the water is either ON or it's OFF. I'm a binary kind of girl and I like 1/4 turn ball valves.

Remove big ball float if your toilet has a big ball float instead of a Fluidmaster. (This is so that you can get to the right hand tank bolt. If you don't unscrew the big ball float, you will spend the next fifteen minutes having it be in the way. Just take it off.) Undo nuts from tank bolts so that tank pulls free from for-sitting part. Empty the rest of the water in the tank out onto your pants or, optionally, into the tub.

Now that the tank is nominally empty of water, turn it over and remove the foam black thing on the neck. Discard as it's single-use. You should have gotten a new one from the hardware when you were there getting an overflow assembly. But, y'know, you're a dumb ass. Go back to the hardware and get a replacement foam black thing. The hardware people are laughing *with* you, really.

Unscrew large plastic nut holding overflow assembly. (You will need a channel locks for this and it won't be able to get a good bite because the nut is too big in diameter. Persevere.) Remove defective overflow assembly.

Put new overflow assembly in place, affix new large plastic nut. Tighten large plastic nut until it doesn't leak but not so tight that it breaks the fucking porcelain. Oh, and you can't tell if it leaks or not because there's no water in it. :) Just do the best you can. (It'll leak later, when you've got everything all together again and then you can take it back apart again while tenant and his buddy (both men, over fifty, watching you fuck up intently) observe you and your fucking up for entertainment purposes.)

Put foam black thing on neck. Turn tank right side up, put in appropriate location on the for-sitting-on part of the toilet. Use washers, rubber washers, bolts to affix tank to for-sitting-on part. Again with the tightening a bit but not too much because you will break the fucking porcelain. (If you thought "Offering to the porcelain gods" was just an eloquent way to say "vomiting" you thought wrong. Toilets are still made of porcelain. They will break if you are mean to them. They will break (satisfyingly!) if you hurl them into a steel drop box. And they will break if you tighten the bolts too much. How do you know when it's too much? The porcelain breaks. D'oh.) So, tighten less than that. "Not enough" tightening means that the toilet assembly leaks. In a perfect world, there exists an amount of tightening between "does not leak" and "breaks the fucking porcelain" but that's a bit much to hope for.

Hook up the supply line. Reassemble ball float. Tell tenant to turn the water on.

Observe as everything leaks. Tighten tank bolts some. Doesn't stop leaks. Tighten some more. Still leaking. Try not to strangle tenant looking at you going "It's still leaking." It's likely that he thinks his input is helping. Fuck. Shut off water. Take all the shit apart again. Tighten up big plastic nut on overflow assembly. More. Reassemble. Turn water on. It leaks *less* so that's good. Tighten things up. Leaking slows. Tighten. Leaking stops. Yay!

Call M to tell her of your progress. (It is now noon.) M. sends you to 28 W 4th where the toilet does not flush. This is the third toilet you have looked at today. Monday: it's for toilets.

Plunging the toilet does not do anything useful. Plunger is now covered in ick. Fortunately, you broght along a five gallon bucket (empty) to put icky things in. Good for you. You try snaking the toilet. Yep, something is down the toilet. (This is a house hold of grown ups.) Additional snaking yields a piece of wire, about a foot and a half long. Not sure what that was doing down the toilet but everything is much better with the toilet now that the wire is not there. Write tenants a note including (a) wire and (b) emergency number which they claim not to have.

Onward. Go to 219 to fix bathroom sink drain. Do that. Remember how much you <3 PVC. Put new hasp for lock on basement door to replace one that Mike beat in pieces opening basement door on Saturday morning. Pick up shop vac from #4. Note that tenant left it full of icky water from his flood. Oh, Frabjous day! Just what Monday needs: More ick. There are three pennies in the icky water; pick them up and put them in your pocket.

Go to 633, which needs fuel oil it being Monday. Fire is out. Fuel is gone. Get fuel from tank on hill. Discover that tank on hill is nearly empty. Pour fuel on tank, on coat, all over everything. Some of it actually gets into the tank despite best efforts otherwise. Bleed fuel line. Again. Again. Remember that fuel line has a lengthy run and that this furnace takes like three or four tries to bleed out. Start furnace. Yay. Pipes have not frozen or anything, so you're golden there.

Drive back into Bedford. Look at upstairs tub issue at 315. It's not plumbing that is leaking. Recaulk seam. Discuss situation with tenant. Tub needs new surround put in and sliding door reset. Make mental note to discuss this with owner -- basically there's a half inch gap between the surround and the surface of the tub. This is a bit much to try to fill in with caulk. Sliding doors need to be pulled, put in new tub surround, reinstall sliding doors. Willie can do this if it is desired.

Call mortgage people about the aforementioned mortage thing. Tell them we need to talk to the person wanting the mortgage. Call bank about grandma's taxes -- they're claiming she didn't pay taxes for 2007 but she did and we have the cancelled check and everything. Lie and tell bank that you are grandma. Bank is credulous, promises to fax a copy of the canceled check so that we can send it off to the state.

Meet with person who "wants mortgage". He has not yet offered on building. Hell, he hasn't even been through it yet. Not sure why these people are wasting my time. Politely usher them out of office with the fact that I can't do much until they have more solid numbers. Also prospective buyer cheats on taxes and shares this with me inside of five minutes. Yes, the government does take a big bite of your tip income but them's breaks, baby. You're going to want services from the government when you're older. Pay up. PAY THE FUCK UP. I do. Cheating on your taxes is asshattery of the first order and I hope you go to jail. Fuckwit.

Drop off payment for fuel fuck up at 321 at Bedford Valley. Stop at Walmart. Buy more diesel for 633. Put diesel in 633, 9 gallons.

Road still not passable. Left hip hurts. Oh, and it's snowing. I don't think I can get the fucking plow up the road (3 to 5 inches says the forecast) seeing as how the road is a sheet of fucking ice. Clearly I have accumulated some very bad karma, here.