Wrenchin' Wretards
No offense intended to folks who are mentally challenged. No really. The things I am about to speak of are really insulting the intelligence of folks who struggle intellectually. To be clear, the folks who are in such a situation are often the happiest most content folks I have ever met.
That said "Wretard" just seemed to trip right off the old keyboard better than "Toolbox idiots" or something.
Now then with that out of the way - What exactly do I mean by "Wrenching Wretard"? Well I a certain you have al encountered it at some time or other. Usualy it shows when you take posession of something that was at one time owned by someone else. Less often will it show in a brand new item. What may seem like "Wrenching Wretardedness" in a new item is actually driven by an economic need for planned obsolesence. But really it shows in used items and is almost always not readily apparent. Typically WW makes itself known when the "fix" fails and requires you to dig in and set things to rights.
For example, used motorcycles (after all I am about bikes) I have encountered a lot of older Guzzis and BMWs. And inevitably there is wome form of WW going on. Guzzis often have some of the most obvious and heinous WW. One poor old beast I got had lamp cord replacing most of the wiring. Yeah thats right....LAMP CORD Single color. Wrapped in miles of electical and duct tape. I even found household wiring nuts on the poor thing. Oh I could go on and on.
But today I encountered yet another WW in my own home. We bought the house some time ago and have been slowly improving it as we get some of the initial financial shock paid down. Now it is a 70+ year old house. I certainly expect some WW throughout. But this place has been one ludicrous discovery after another. Early on I went to replace a light fixture over the stove that was no longer functioning. I get a nice unit from the local hardware emporioum and proceed to remove the old fixture. Then I start to follow the wiring to where it is presumably plugged in. After all it is a standard plug in type unit. I follow the cord along the bottom of the shelf to the cabinet. Open the cabinet and move items around to locate the cord...and conitue following it up to where it simply disappears into the wall. Yay. Now I have visions of a wall outlet mounted behind the plaster. Well I wasnt ready to rip aprt the wall yet. The kitchen will see a remodel in the near future. But that give you an idea of the sort of thinking that went on. I have found hosts of other nutty things but today sort of took the cake.
My wife noticed that the clothes washer was leaking. Huh? cant be. We just bought that thing this fall. So I start running some cycles to try to find the leak and see what it needs. Oh no...it aint the washer. There is a drain right underneath it. Apparently the washer drains down that same hole. at another spot. The whole thing was backing up and coming up the drain and making a nice puddle under the washer. Drat. Now I have visions of drain snakes and big hair clogs. ew. I go to the back of the house and crawl under the back deck to see if I can locate the drain. Lo and behold I find a pipe jutting from the foundation. Connected to that, half buried in the dirt is a plastic flexi hose that runs along the foundation for about 8' and then it disappears through the cinder block. Oh boy. I climb under the house and find the flexi hose makes another turn and is glued to a plastic veertical pipe that is cemented into a wall and goes who knows where, but most definitely not into the septic system. I open the inspection plug (surprise! there is one!) and shine a light in there. I can see the 90 degree elbow is packed with dirt. I run a washer cycle and promptly get washed down as the pipe fills and over pressurizes the flex hose. Oh fer cryin out loud. I can see how this Rube Goldberg set up came to be. When the PO dug out an area under the house and cemented it for the furnace and water heater, he made a dry well for the washer. But it is UNDER the goddam cement. And when the uility room cement was poured, a pipe was laid in to drain the washer. But going under the house and connecting to the septic made too much sense and meant cutting a hole in the side of the foundation. Oh and it made WAY too much sense to just go out from the utility room and to any open spot on the full huge acre of land and go straight down to a dry well. Nooooo it was so much better to cobble ill fitting items and make a series of twists and turns.
So now I have to rip the deck off the house (needed oing anyways. WW #28758-N - the deck wasnt sealed properly and is rotting) and figure out how to fix this mess the right way. Dry wells are frowned on in this area. So my best bet is to dig a trench along the back of the house and install an actual 2" drain pipe and then hook it to the septic system. I figure I get to do the enjoyable diggin' part and then pay a plumber to install a T on the main septic line. My other option is to remove the utility room entirely and put in a line that goes under the house and then rebuild the utility room. Not a happy thing.
Goddam I hate wrenchinwretards.
That said "Wretard" just seemed to trip right off the old keyboard better than "Toolbox idiots" or something.
Now then with that out of the way - What exactly do I mean by "Wrenching Wretard"? Well I a certain you have al encountered it at some time or other. Usualy it shows when you take posession of something that was at one time owned by someone else. Less often will it show in a brand new item. What may seem like "Wrenching Wretardedness" in a new item is actually driven by an economic need for planned obsolesence. But really it shows in used items and is almost always not readily apparent. Typically WW makes itself known when the "fix" fails and requires you to dig in and set things to rights.
For example, used motorcycles (after all I am about bikes) I have encountered a lot of older Guzzis and BMWs. And inevitably there is wome form of WW going on. Guzzis often have some of the most obvious and heinous WW. One poor old beast I got had lamp cord replacing most of the wiring. Yeah thats right....LAMP CORD Single color. Wrapped in miles of electical and duct tape. I even found household wiring nuts on the poor thing. Oh I could go on and on.
But today I encountered yet another WW in my own home. We bought the house some time ago and have been slowly improving it as we get some of the initial financial shock paid down. Now it is a 70+ year old house. I certainly expect some WW throughout. But this place has been one ludicrous discovery after another. Early on I went to replace a light fixture over the stove that was no longer functioning. I get a nice unit from the local hardware emporioum and proceed to remove the old fixture. Then I start to follow the wiring to where it is presumably plugged in. After all it is a standard plug in type unit. I follow the cord along the bottom of the shelf to the cabinet. Open the cabinet and move items around to locate the cord...and conitue following it up to where it simply disappears into the wall. Yay. Now I have visions of a wall outlet mounted behind the plaster. Well I wasnt ready to rip aprt the wall yet. The kitchen will see a remodel in the near future. But that give you an idea of the sort of thinking that went on. I have found hosts of other nutty things but today sort of took the cake.
My wife noticed that the clothes washer was leaking. Huh? cant be. We just bought that thing this fall. So I start running some cycles to try to find the leak and see what it needs. Oh no...it aint the washer. There is a drain right underneath it. Apparently the washer drains down that same hole. at another spot. The whole thing was backing up and coming up the drain and making a nice puddle under the washer. Drat. Now I have visions of drain snakes and big hair clogs. ew. I go to the back of the house and crawl under the back deck to see if I can locate the drain. Lo and behold I find a pipe jutting from the foundation. Connected to that, half buried in the dirt is a plastic flexi hose that runs along the foundation for about 8' and then it disappears through the cinder block. Oh boy. I climb under the house and find the flexi hose makes another turn and is glued to a plastic veertical pipe that is cemented into a wall and goes who knows where, but most definitely not into the septic system. I open the inspection plug (surprise! there is one!) and shine a light in there. I can see the 90 degree elbow is packed with dirt. I run a washer cycle and promptly get washed down as the pipe fills and over pressurizes the flex hose. Oh fer cryin out loud. I can see how this Rube Goldberg set up came to be. When the PO dug out an area under the house and cemented it for the furnace and water heater, he made a dry well for the washer. But it is UNDER the goddam cement. And when the uility room cement was poured, a pipe was laid in to drain the washer. But going under the house and connecting to the septic made too much sense and meant cutting a hole in the side of the foundation. Oh and it made WAY too much sense to just go out from the utility room and to any open spot on the full huge acre of land and go straight down to a dry well. Nooooo it was so much better to cobble ill fitting items and make a series of twists and turns.
So now I have to rip the deck off the house (needed oing anyways. WW #28758-N - the deck wasnt sealed properly and is rotting) and figure out how to fix this mess the right way. Dry wells are frowned on in this area. So my best bet is to dig a trench along the back of the house and install an actual 2" drain pipe and then hook it to the septic system. I figure I get to do the enjoyable diggin' part and then pay a plumber to install a T on the main septic line. My other option is to remove the utility room entirely and put in a line that goes under the house and then rebuild the utility room. Not a happy thing.
Goddam I hate wrenchinwretards.
posted by Z at
5:34 PM
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