reflections of captain numbnuts

many of you know that i'm building a room onto the back of my house. i've been working on the room since february and have made pretty good progress, considering that i can mostly only work on it during the weekends and have no training whatsoever in any of this stuff. i couldn't even build a skateboard ramp as a kid. up until yesterday, i'd been doing pretty well. no major screw ups or snafoos. however...the doo-doo hit the lasko last nite.

i installed plumbing over the weekend for a pet bathing tub (note: future homeowners will probably make this a sun room with a wetbar. for me and the wife, it's a pet grooming room.). i got my plumbing inspection yesterday. i mostly passed (i had an issue with the drain, but he passed me for now so i can move forward with insulation and drywall) and was thoroughly. fucking. stoked.

around 4p my phone starts blowing up with calls from the wife. i thought she just had a question or whatever and i'm busy at the day job so i hit the "ignore" button for the first 3 calls. i thought by the 4th i should pick up. the plumbing broke. blew up, even. all over the kitchen. she's freaking out because she can't get the lid off of the main water supply outside and doesn't know what to do and and and and. luckily, there were some neighbors outside who she flagged down that were kind (or scared enough) to help her shut off the water supply.

we have no accurate measurement of how long the water was flooding into the kitchen, but our guess is somewhere between an hour to 90 minutes. it was enough water to cover the kitchen floor, soak the rugs in the hallway, go through the baseboard/drywall into our bedroom (which shares a wall with the kitchen), and make all of our hardwood look like utter shit. we'll probably have to replace it. hopefully the bedroom carpet and drywall will be fine. my confidence, however, is shot.

i woke up twice last nite thinking i heard water running. we turned the main water supply off when we left the house today for fear of coming home and seeing the dogs swimming around the couch.

bob vila can suck on my balls for making this repair/remodeling stuff look so easy.