Curmudgeon’s Non-Vacation: Part 6: The Loss

You know what happened next. I turned on the water and it leaked. I’ve experienced worse. It wasn’t a catastrophic WHOOSH of utter failure. It wasn’t nearly as bad as the leak I’d discovered that morning.

It was the steady drip, drip, drip of “nice try but you suck”.

The drip was small and I had a plumber coming in 3 hours. I thought about giving up.

But that’s not my style. I’d done what needed doing, I just hadn’t torqued down to a watertight fitment because my channel locks were shit. What I needed was a real pipe wrench… maybe two.

So tried again. I turned off the water, removed stuff, re-torqued stuff as best I could and wound up soaked again. Finally I realized you can’t “outthink” the lack of wrench. I went to the hardware store again.

So if I started agitated, progressed to hangry, and had drifted into the next level of hell what would that be? Depression. On the drive to the hardware store for the second time that day I flat out gave up on living.

At Mrs. Curmudgeon’s urging, I pulled into a coffee shop and ordered a sandwich and cup of hope. Half an hour and several ounces of caffeine later, I was willing to try again. I had mixed feelings. It boils down to the “three rules”:

1. If your only idea is to do what you’ve been doing but harder.* You’re probably doing it wrong.

2. If you’re getting bigger equipment to address #1, you’re probably still doing it wrong but now you will break more shit and spread devastation. Lessons of rule #2 cost lots of money.

3. Sometimes #1 and #2 don’t apply. If all you really need is a cheater bar, then a cheater bar will work. The question is how do you know? If you know through experience, have at it. If you think this is true but don’t know a fucking thing, put the tools away and take a nap.

[Warning: Political rant about “do the same shit but harder”. Skip ahead if you wish.]

*”Do the same thing but do it harder” is the problem solving approach used in politics. It never works. It’s why problems never go away. Shit that’s got us in a panic in 2024 were problems 50 years ago too. They’ll stay problems until something changes the pattern. (If 350 Congressional incumbents and the top 20% of both parties all decided to run off and join the circus, old problems would vanish in a fortnight. A new crop of new idiots would use new ideas to create new problems but at least the problems would be interesting. Subsequently, they would work hard to cement their ass in the same elected offices and thus cement their asshole problems in place for forever too.) For example, most voters are too young to know illegal immigration was an issue during the Carter/Reagan election but it’s true. Now, 50 years and many million people later and it’s still the same fucking “urgent problem”. After 50 years of ignoring the will of the people instability is rampant. The State of Texas is in active revolt against the Federal Government which is using Federal resources specifically to break Federal law right in front of God and everybody. I’m confused about the Federal Government choosing to break Federal Law but it’s a half century old tradition now. That’s what “more and harder forever” looks like.

[/Rant]

I went back to the hardware store and bought two big ass wrenches.

The first was a gift to myself. I just plain wanted a nice wrench. It wasn’t cheap but if I’m going to waste a weekend afternoon fucking with pipes in the basement, the least I can do is get myself a good pipe wrench.

OK this is interesting. The photo is of the one I bought. I tried to link to one on Amazon and they’re sold out. Pipe wrenches… sold out. Can you imagine those two things in the same sentence?

“I wanted a good 14″ pipe wrench and tickets to a rock concert. Both were sold out. Also, we apparently live in an alternative universe where pipe wrenches are rare.”

Also, it makes my little gift to myself seem a lot nicer. I have a new pipe wrench and you can never have the tool that I bought! My plan for world domination is progressing! Bwa ha ha ha ha ha…

By now I was probably cracking up. The other wrench I bought was nothing special. Here it is next to a slightly smaller wrench I’ve owned forever (I probably found it in the dirt somewhere).

Back at home I eyed my two big wrenches and thought about the mistakes I’ve made in life that put me where I am now. I wanted to rush to get it done so I could cancel the plumber, who would justly rake me over the coals for a weekend “emergency” visit. But…

All I was going to do was reef on some fittings. Just bitch slapping components is never a good idea. Unless you’re Jeremy Clarkson fixing a BMW with a sledgehammer.

I poured a drink, sat on the couch, and rested. The plumber would come. I’d tried. I’d failed… though only a small failure. But failure is failure. And I’ve hit the stage in life where you cut a check when the fix it guy shows up and are glad to have the chance.

I waited. As I did, Mrs. Curmudgeon told me the story of the plumber. Stay with me…