Monday, May 26, 2008

Holy Flood Batman!!

I woke up this morning and looked outside and saw that it had rained and didn't really think much of it. As I let the dog out I looked closer and realized that it had rained quite a bit. Almost two inches! That's a lot! Once again still didn't really think much of it. Then I had to run downstairs to put some towels in the laundry and realized that my entire basement was flooded! Only about an inch of water or so, but that really is a lot of water. I waded through the water to check out the drain and realized that it was not draining at all. Not good. I thought about it for a while and kind of put of doing anything cause I didn't know what to do then I went down stairs again over an hour later and there was more water! It wasn't even raining! At this point I realized that I had to do something.
So I googled it. Then I made the trip to Lowes to purchase a new shop vac so that I could get the water out of there. Sounds simple enough. Buying the thing and putting it together was the easy part. What I didn't think of at the time is that I would have to somehow empty the shop vac when it was full. I live in a very old house with very narrow and steep staircases. Not ideal when trying to carry this huge shop vac full of 16 gallons of water. By the way 16 gallons is heavy, really, really, really heavy!! But I had a brilliant realization. I have a walk out basement. The older portion of the house has a smaller dirt floor basement that is connected to the rest of the basement, but it has a small door that leads to stairs out straight to the backyard. This was my best route to get the water out.
At this point I commenced the tedious/exhausting task of getting the water out of the basement. What feels like 18 trips later, I got it done. My back and my arms will be killing me tomorrow, but the floor has no more water on it. Of course the drain is still not draining so it isn't fixed yet.
Part of being an ignorant homeowner I don't even know if I have a sump pump that could have gone out. Maybe it is just a clog, but I don't think so. Luckily my friends dad is a pretty handy guy and gonna come check it out for me. If it is the sump pump I am in luck because my home warranty cover it . . . how great would that be. If not, I gotta call a plumber anyway and then pay for it.
Ugh, well happy memorial day everyone!

Saturday, May 10, 2008

You scared me!

Last night I got home from work late and Cletus was here waiting for me and dying to get outside so he could go to the bathroom. When he came inside he was dripping blood from there (sorry, I won't be graphic). It scared me, moments later it stopped, but I turned him on his back to see if I could figure out what was happening. It stopped, but I was still worried.

Then early this morning I woke up and let him out again and the same thing happened. This time I followed him around to see if it was in his pee or separate. (Once again, sorry a little gross). But, it wasn't. So now I am really confused, but I have to go to work . . . so I called the vet and set an appointment for this afternoon cause I was really scared. When blood comes out of somewhere that it isn't supposed to it is pretty scary.

So I took the little man to the vet this afternoon . . . which he didn't like a bit. Granted no one likes to be poked and prodded. But she determined that it was a simple prostate infection that would be cleared up with antibiotics. So $200 later we were on our way home. I felt relieved, but here is hoping that the antibiotics work and this is really all that it is.