I Can Haz Shower!

Hey, my internet is back up! Although I'm still sort of down a service, because I just realized my garbage wasn't picked up today. Probably because the plumbers' truck was parked in front of it.

So, my exciting plumbing adventures... Apparently the hard part with this kind of leak is finding the damn thing. They initially thought it was in the house somewhere, so first they drained and took out my water heater so they could get at the spot where the water lines come into the house. (This also involved cutting a hole in the wall behind the heater. Which, if you have to have a hole cut in your wall somewhere, is probably the very best spot for it. Hey, it's behind the water heater! Who cares?) So, they got in there, cut into those pipes, and installed some valves or something so they could shut off water to the part of the system where they suspected the problem was. But it turned out it wasn't there at all, as evidenced by the fact that the water meter kept running. Apparently that narrowed it down to the pipes coming into the house, though, so they then proceeded to dig a big hole in my front yard. And lo and behold, there it was! Not actually under the house at all -- which is a good thing -- but just outside. I think they spent about three hours troubleshooting and maybe fifteen minutes actually fixing the pipe.

Here's the hole, with the culprit pipe. (I believe this is after they cut the bad section out and before they installed the new bit.) The edge of the concrete slab my house sits on is visible at the top.



And here's a close-up:



That's a lot of mud! At least, as far as I can tell, it hasn't made my house list over any more than usual. So far.

So, anyway, there we go. Kind of a huge-ass mess, but it could have been a lot worse. And my carpets are already starting to dry out.