Tuesday, August 7, 2012

A water fountain!

Seems as though our sticks and bricks residence was just waiting for me to return back here to Kansas.  It wanted to show me that it had missed me taking care of its little quirks and temper tantrums, so it had to show me... once I arrived....

The yard seemed rather burned up for having used a bunch of money's worth of water this last month...  But I started an extra irrigation cycle when I returned from parking the motorhome in the storage lot last night....

It was late in the day and I went inside just bushed after washing the rig in the park and driving home...  Then the several hour unload and storage parking,  which caused me to doze in the big chair...

I was awakened by some door bell ringing, but wanted to continue the nap, so I didn't go answer it...  We get solicitors at all times of the day and even on Sunday....  But in a little while the door bell rang again, and this time it was more of a poignant ring, like the ringer was trying to make it ring as fast and furious as they could.....   And it didn't stop, so I struggled back awake...

I went to the door and my neighbor lady to our West said Hey you got a problem out here and need to take a look at it...  Her husband had our irrigation control box opened up and was shutting off the main valve to the sprinkler system.....  But it wasn't off fast enough for me to not see the towering issue of water coming from out of the ground over between their property and ours...

Something is broken on the high pressure side of the line or valve that does that zone...  Water was pouring out of the ground and down the street in a massive river...  Of course the kids were having a ball riding their bikes in the now half filled street...  The stream was a half of a block long and then went down a storm sewer...

Of course with the drought, calls to our irrigation company did not find us with an appointment until Friday morning, and I was sternly apprised as to the cost of this endeavor....  $89 just to come see what might be wrong and then a c note for every hour after that, plus parts........  These are plumbers after all...

After hanging up with the irrigation folks, I reached up to turn on the ceiling fan in the family room as I was hot,  (under the collar).....   And evidently I pulled on the chain a bit hard and the whole thing came out in my hand....  Good land!  Does that mean I need to go buy a new fan for here as well??

Over at Home Depot, I purchased another switch, while  their electrical fellow assured me it would fix the problem, and a portable stand fan to use as well...  Or in the mean time.....

Tonight when I took the fan apart, I found that the switch I purchased had three wires and the broken one had four...........   So instead of Home Depot, I tried Lowes, and they had three wire, four wire and 5-8 wire switches...  I asked the guy at that counter and he reached over and handed me the four wire and explained how to install it...  It will fix you right up!!

So tonight my fan is fixed up, but I didn't even have the urge to go dig up the parking along the West side of the driveway....  But if we wait until Friday, at least the water will dry up and we won't be digging in the mud so much....

And look at the bright side, this valve waited patiently for us to return home before cracking and creating a fountain, like it was in the center of a public square....

Retired Rod

2 comments:

  1. Oops. Not so good for the water bill. We (well, I) usually have leaking issues as a result of frost, but they usually show up first thing in the spring, right after I've turned on the water. The "kids" have been manually watering in my absence, since it was too much of a chore to try and explain all the intricacies of charging the system and then blowing out the lines in the fall again. Keeps them busy.
    At least the ground will be soft for digging with all that water leaking out. See? Positive spin.
    Happy now?

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  2. Isn't it great to be back home? All these little things to worry about and take care of. At least the whole fan didn't come down on your head so that was good news.

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