Water conspiracy

It took us a while to catch on, but there is definitely a conspiracy going on in the water system in our house.

When we moved in, the shower head in our bathroom behaved like any other shower head. You turned it on, water came out, and operatic sounds started issuing from somewhere deep inside you. But gradually, less and less water started coming out when the hot water faucet was turned on. Then, the same thing happened with the cold water. The shower head would spit, and gurgle, and sputter, until finally, ploink -- a single drop would come out. (Also gradually, those operatic sounds gave way to other sounds, but that is not the point here.)

We treated this problem as we treat all household enigmas: We ignored it, confident that this course of action would somehow, miraculously, encourage the problem to fix itself.

Of course this did not work. If it had, I would be writing a bestseller on how to fix all of one's household problems by ignoring them, instead of writing this blog.

The other thing we did in response to this progressive malfunctioning of the shower head was to adapt ourselves to it. For instance, we stood very still under the small stream of water that would condescend to come out, cupped our hands to catch the water, and threw it over ourselves. We also jiggled the faucet handles back and forth in an effort to coax more water out, sometimes pleading, sometimes threatening. These actions, of course, only made the shower head more bold and encouraged it to behave in even stranger ways. Eventually, when we turned on both faucets full blast, absolutely nothing came out of the cold. Hot water would come out after about 5 minutes of vigorous turning of the handle back and forth while singing "The Hokey Pokey" ("The Hokey Pokey," in case you did not know, has been scientifically PROVEN to be effective in these cases, in the same way that lifting your feet off the floor of an airplane is effective in keeping the airplane from crashing).

Now while all this was happening, we had noticed some mysterious spots on our kitchen floor near the sink. Of course we applied our standard treatment, ignoring the problem, to this as well. But one day I grabbed something under the sink and noticed that it felt somewhat damp. I did a quick little calculation and decided that if I were to ignore this problem any further, we would soon have a MUCH bigger problem than no water coming out of the shower head upstairs.

So I ventured a closer look under the kitchen sink and saw what appeared to be a sixth Great Lake, complete with rainbow trout, pleasure boaters, etc. I took a deep breath and emitted the Female Homeowner's Distress Cry: "Ohhhh NOOOOOO! THERE'S WATER UNDER THE SIIIIIIIIINK!!!!"

The Female Homeowner's Distress Cry is meant, of course, to startle the male homeowner into action. Unfortunately, sometimes the timing of the alarm is a little off, and the male being so summoned might happen to be in the shower when the alarm sounds. This is unfortunate. When one is startled in the shower, one is apt to knock one's noggin against the shower head, which puts one in, shall we say, not a very good mood. So the male homeowner in residence was not particularly thrilled when I showed him the events transpiring under the kitchen sink and said meekly, "I think I've found where all the water that's supposed to be going to the shower has been hiding out."

Not all stories have a happy ending. Or even any ending at all. Unfortunately, this is one of those stories. Although we got the lake mess cleaned up (boaters escorted from the premises, etc.) and replaced the kitchen faucet, this has had no effect whatsoever on the water output in the shower. The conspiracy continues, as does our tendency to ignore the problem.