If trouble comes in 3's, I should be done now. Please, Lord, let it be done now.
When I got home from Baja I went through my bills--why were my gas bill and water bill so high? What? My water bill said I used an average of 600 gallons of water a day while I was gone! When I'm home and watering the lawn I use about 150 gallons a day. I had a plumber confirm my worst suspicion--I have a hot water leak. So my water heater was running nonstop for weeks. It took time to figure that out, my most recent water bill was significantly higher. Imagine the cost of water in California during a drought. Two months in a row of crazy high water and gas bills, and by crazy high I mean a couple hundred dollars.
So I have that hot water leak. Probably under my slab flooring. I could pay a few thousand to find the leak, have someone jackhammer through the inside of my house, and fix that one leak--and go through it all again for the next leak, as the pipes are 60 years old. So I'm having the entire house replumbed through the attic, at a cost with 5 digits. And no, insurance doesn't cover this; they'd cover damage to the house if there had been water damage, but they don't cover the pipe itself and the needed repair. So I have to deal with it.
Work on the plumbing starts Monday. Students showed up to school yesterday. I started to leave the house this morning for my second day with students and what did I see? Last night someone broke into my travel trailer. They didn't trash it, but they definitely did damage getting in and they stole some things.
Right now, I'm not a very happy camper.
ouch, ouch, ouch!
ReplyDeleteWe had a leaking water main -- on the house side, naturally, rather than the city side-- which cause skyrocketing water bills.
Luckily, we were able to just install a new PEX pipe between the meter and the house, bypassing the old inlet valve entirely (which would have required a concrete garage floor to be torn up in a corner).
We dug the trench between the meter and the foundation ourselves, which saved few thousand dollars.
But re-piping....yeesh! I feel for ya, man. Our fifty year old pipes could probably use some of that, but so far so good.
And some bastard rifling through your trailer-- argggg.
Wish you lived nearby. I just finished re-piping my sister-in-laws 70 year-old house. Also re-piped my and my son's townhouses. A good bottle of Scotch would have been a lot cheaper for you.
ReplyDeleteFlying you out, putting you in a hotel, and purchasing materials and scotch would *still* probably be cheaper than what I'm being charged!!!
ReplyDeleteAlas, I just started helping my son remodel his kitchen. Don't have time for a California excursion just now. Good luck to you.
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