Day Three-Thirty-Two - God Bless Darlene Whoever She Is....

I have exciting news.  There was no broken water pipe under my foundation.  That was just an example of me assuming the worst since that is what usually happens.  Turns out that the connection for the supply line on the sink in my downstairs powder room was loose.... very loose.  Like the plumber said it was almost not connected and that was the source of the leak.  the weird thing is that my dad installed that faucet about 5 years ago and no one has touched it since.  I'm sure that Dad tightened it.  So, it makes you wonder how it could have loosened itself.  And then why water didn't start shooting out of it and flood things until after they came and worked on the valve outside and turned the water off....  But hey, it is fixed, my bathroom is almost dry, my kitchen is already dry and no jackhammers were used.  I'll take it.

The plumbers that the HOA sent over were really nice guys and I might be getting some travel business from them.  While they were listening for leaks with their equipment, one of them glanced at my digital picture frame that was displaying photos of the reef in my favorite location, Roatan and asked where it was.  So I told him and he asked if I was a scuba diver.  Turns out that both of them are.  One of them has his master certification but he has never dove anyplace besides the lake that they go to for certifications and stuff in Terrell.  So, I told them about the prices I had found on Roatan trips and they both took business cars with them when they left. One of them is considering a cruise next month so he said he'd be calling me about that asap.  Woohoo!  So, I suppose every cloud has a silver lining.  

But here's the weird part of it all.  So, my HOA sent these guys over.  I had talked with the property manager yesterday morning and she told me that she was having trouble locating plumbers with the equipment that can detect a leak under the foundation who could come out right away.  The first place she talked to was backed up three weeks.  Then she found another who said they could send someone on Tuesday but she had a friend who was close friends with someone who owned this other plumbing company and she was going to pull some strings and see if they would squeeze me in yesterday.  But the friend had to initiate the call in order to get her buddy to do this.  So, this was going to be a personal favor to the friend of the property manager.

While the plumbers were here and we were all talking, one of them got a call from the owner of the company and when he got off the phone, he turns to the other plumber and says, "We have to make sure we do this right, she's a friend of Darlene's."  So, the second plumber turns to me and says, "You know Darlene?"  I didn't know what to do, but I thought I should go along with it, you know for Darlene's sake, whoever she is.    I'm assuming that she is the friend of the property manager who called in the personal favor.  So, I just kind of nodded and smiled.  These guys started telling me all kinds of stories about Darlene.  Apparently one of these plumbers got married last week and Darlene was practically dancing on tables at his wedding.  What could I say, "Yep, that's Darlene!"

So anyway, before they left I told them that I thought their company had replaced my water heater several years ago.  So, they wanted to see it.  They went out to the garage and opened the water heater door and immediately found an exhaust pipe that wasn't connected properly.  The one guy said it was a fire hazard and went to his truck got some stuff out and fixed it.  When they left I asked them what I owed.  He said that Darlene and Charlie (his boss would work it out).  Man, I hope Darlene and Charlie are tight!  Since the repairs that needed to be made were all inside the house, they are my responsibility since the HOA only owns the outside of the building.  We'll see.  I'll probably get a $1,500 bill in the mail next week with my luck.  If I don't get a bill, I might have to send flowers to Darlene.