Proof That God Has a Sense Of Humor, A Plumbing Tale

Today I make a remark about not being all that found of plumbing and Poof our gutter turns into a waterfall. Truthfully this has been going on for years, but I assumed that the gutter was always plugged at the top, which it always has been.

But since it was pouring all over the place to the amusement of my niece and nephew, I drug the ladder out of the garage to clean it out while nature was providing me with constant water. I cleaned out the obstruction and immediately noticed a gyser at the base of the downspout. That can’t be good, I thought to myself.

So, I went to the street to see if I could see where the water should be discharging. I found the tube, but as expected nothing was coming out of it. So I went to the garage and grabbed a small diameter piece of wood to see if I could reach the obstruction. Unfortunately, I could only get about 4 inches in and the blockage was very hard.

Plan B. I go to the shed and pull out the heavy artillery. One large spade and a hand trowel and back to the front yard I went. I dug up a smallish portion of yard about 1 foot wide by about 2.5 feet long. Immediately I see a problem. I find the end of the PVC that is sticking through the curb, but it ends about 8 inches behind the curb. Another 10 or so inches behind that is another piece of PVC. I am at this point assuming that this piece runs all the way back to the house but I’m also positive that it is totally full of dirt, leaves, seed pods and anything else that could wash down the downspout. This is definitely going to take a plumber’s snake and that is going to be a project for another day.

Oh, the blockage at the curb? Someone pushed a beer bottle into the end and it just happened to have the exact diameter of the PVC. How kind of them to make sure that the streets didn’t get wet.