Gratuitous Domestic Posting (TM) - "It's Da Plumber. I come ta fix da sink!"*

The kitchen faucet died Friday, succumbing, I think, simply to age and fatigue. When turned on one minute it was fine. The next, it was spewing water in ten different directions from a galaxy of pin-prick holes.

What to do about it? Well, it didn't strike me as anything I couldn't reasonably handle myself, so after I took the eldest Llama-ette out for breakfast Saturday morning, we duly trekked over to Home Despot and picked out a new one.

Conceptually, there is nothing very complicated about this task. But let me just tell you here and now that replacing a kitchen faucet is a messy, soggy job. I've never tinkered with plumbing repairs before, but I do have the sense to know one is supposed to shut off the water before taking anything apart. Nonetheless, no matter how much care one takes in turning off the main and allowing the open taps to drain, the fact is that as soon as one disconnects the pipes, water is going to start dribbling out of them. Right on to the floor of the cabinet. The floor on which one is going to have to lie in order to work on the faucet from underneath. The floor, also, on which the kitchen trashcan lives. Bleh.

Furthermore, at least in our case, when the faucet was installed thirty years ago, somebody went high, wide and handsome with the putty and sealant. Over the years, the whole assembly had got quite cruddy and corroded. The only way to shake it loose was to go at it with a screwdriver from underneath, thereby adding a generous sprinkling of junk to the slop in which I was lying.

(I should mention here that the seven year old, who was assisting me by shining the flashlight in all the wrong places, was indignant that she wasn't being allowed to get messy. At one point, she asked if maybe she couldn't just stick her feet in, just to get a little dirty. I flatly refused. But I made it up to her by allowing her to push and pull on the faucet from above while I winkled away at it from below. Destruction proved to be a suitable substitute for sloppiness.)

The other thing I can tell you is that replacing the kitchen faucet is an awkward bastard of a job. As I mentioned, you have to do it lying on your back and working over your head, peering up into a very dark recess. On top of that, the main problem is the vast bulk of the garbage disposal that imposes itself exactly where you need to get your wrench and/or your hands. The whole time, owing to the wet, the dark and the cramped conditions, I had the curious sensation of working in the engine room of a submarine. Fortunately, I have small hands and thin fingers - otherwise, I'm not sure how I'd have managed some of the more remote nuts and screws. (You can stop sniggering, by the way. That's just a myth.)

Anyhoo, at last the new faucet was in and the Moment of Truth arrived. I turned the main back on and then....very gingerly.....tried the faucet. Mirabile dictu, it worked just fine - no ceiling-high geysers, no cold and hot backwards - even the spray hose thingy worked. I've checked the connections to the water lines a couple times since, and so far, no leaks either.

So there you have it. I like to think that if this law gig gets tiresome, I've got another career to fall back on. And who knew chicks dig plumbers so much? But that's a different story. Heh.

(*Spot the quote. An oldy but goody.)