Monday, December 17, 2007

The Coldest Water Known to Man...

... is located in the back of your toilet tank. It's true. It's 10:38pm. Too late to call the Super, I think. Too late to call my Dad, and besides, whenever I call home with a question about home improvement, all I get is an extemporaneous lecture about why I should move back to Rhode Island. My toilet has been running for days now. Some times I can make it stop by taking the lid off the tank and jiggling some things. But now it is time to face facts, I've got a serious problem. I just spent a solid half hour working on it. Goddamn, toilet water is cold. And the bottom of my toilet tank is filled with sediment that is not unlike what your humidifier is gunked up with at the end of the season, but this is worse, because it is inside your toilet.

I had to fetch a flash light. And a flathead screwdriver. I reached my hand in, all the way to the bottom, and I realized that a little bit of the chain was caught under the flap, preventing it from forming a perfect seal. Success! I thought for a moment I was Queen of the Universe. I reassembled my bathroom. But then, like the cursed beating of Poe's Tell-Tale Heart, the running water continued to pound in my ears. I took the whole thing apart again. Look, here's the problem, the float will not, how do you say, float. It always stays a little bit submerged. Why is this happening? So then I tightened the screws that attach the float to the, uh, tower. Success! Queen of the Universe! No. Wait. Water is overflowing out of the toilet tank, onto the floor. Goddamn it, who can I call? Do I have any handy friends? If I call them at 10:30 and intricately describe the mechanical failings of my toilet, will they pretend that I dialed Arecibo instead? I thought about calling MuppetLover and asking her to send her husband over, but I didn't because I am a feminist, a feminist who wastes gallons and gallons of water.

Finally I just did what any self-respecting New Yorker would do - I closed the door so that I could no longer hear the noise and decided to call the Super in the morning.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

why didn't you call drew?