Septic systems
April 4, 2012The bacteria they try to sell you. . .really is necessary. I think you’re wisest to buy it from a septic supplier. I bought some online years ago and ended up with bags of sawdust to flush down my toilet. There COULD have been the needed bacteria in there, but it never seemed to make any difference.
A couple of weeks ago, our whole house backed up. (Gurgling in the kitchen sink is REALLY GROSS! I opened the cleanout and found it full of water, which told me that the plug was between the tank and the cleanout. I plunged it from the cleanout and cleared it. A few days later, it was gurling again. I bought an auger and tried to move the clog through. 25 feet was too short. But I plunged it down again and watched it drain. That lasted about four days. So I bought a longer auger. 50 feet was long enough and after a bit of work, the water all drained away. Whew! That lasted two full days.
So I called a plumber and he reached down there and pulled the plug out. He very politely told me that tampons are NEVER to go down the toilet. Not only do they not break down, they float and therefore tend to cause clogs. Apparently the half roll of paper towels Thomas had flushed down when he cleaned his animal cages wasn’t too good for a sewer pipe either.
So, we now have a properly draining house, a septic tank FULL of necessary bacteria,(the label said it had more than 3 TRILLION of them, which is VERY strong) (I got it at Red Dirt Septic on Waterloo for interested Okies) and since the plumber was here, he fixed a running toilet whose handle we’d been jiggling for a while and a dripping shower(which I had already replaced the O rings and it didn’t help. He replaced the whole cartridge and had to pull it out in bits. It was REALLY stuck).
The plumber told me that the ‘strong and soft toilet paper’ keeps plumbers in business. He recommended that we drop down a notch to the flimsier stuff.
This is probably TMI but I figure that if you use a septic system, it will save you a lot of headache and money if you keep your pipes clear, your septic tank digesting properly and your leach fields draining. If you have wet spots in your leach fields (in dry weather) the septic tank additive will probably fix it.
I thought you ought to know. . .Happy trails.
Having been defeated by my plumbing, I went to Hobby Lobby and bought the new clockwork for our nice wall clock. It was easy to install and so I’m back to feeling smart.
Saturday Morning Short Stories: The Illuminator
March 31, 2012The Beauty Contest
March 26, 2012Saturday Morning short story: Passengers
March 26, 2012Emmajean eased her way down the aisle, trying unsuccessfully to keep her body from bumping those she passed. Sweat trickled down her back, not only from exertion, but from the stress of the moment. The horror of anticipating it had kept her from acting on what she knew was best for years.
The airline had made her buy two seats. It was fair, she knew, but not less humiliating to be given two seat assignments. She kept her eyes down, navigating the shoulders and knees of those sitting on the aisle. She glanced up to see the ‘G’ above the seat she passed and pushed forward, trying to ignore the murmuring that followed her like the wake of a boat.
The plane was very full. Emmajean passed the ‘N’ seats, and surveyed her seat assignment on the ‘P’ row. Her stomach squeezed tightly around her throat. Her seat assignments were both on the ‘P’ row, but on opposite sides of the aisle. She had not noticed until that moment that there were no adjoining seats left in the aircraft.
“Oh no!” she cried. A few neighboring passengers raised their languid eyes to her. She pushed the call button with a trembling finger. The flight attendant strode briskly from the front.
“What seems to be the problem?”
Emmajean handed her the stubs and said as softly as she could, “I bought two seats to accommodate my size, but they’re not adjoining. They’re across the aisle from each other.”
“The flight’s very full. No extra seats.”
“I can see that. But I paid for two. It doesn’t do me any good if they aren’t next to each other.”
The attendant blew out a long sigh and then cried. “Is anyone who’s sitting next to an empty aisle seat willing to move to a new seat?”
“I don’t think so!” One of the three possible passengers mumbled. “We’re not going to sit in separate seats on our honeymoon.” Another woman had a child with her and shook her head.
Emmajean caught the eyes of the few passengers waiting to be seated behind the attendant. The flight was overbooked. The ticket agent must have failed to count her twice. She wondered if her hot face matched the red upholstery yet.
“Here! Sit here by me. This man says he’ll move to another aisle seat and we’ll make room for you.” It was a woman on row ‘N’. There was a small child next to her. The man on the aisle stood up and backed up the other passengers so that Emmajean could get to the seat.
The thin woman pushed the armrest to the back and scooted half way into the window seat where the child pressed himself against the wall. “There’s plenty of room here,” she said.
Emmajean lowered herself into the seat and took the seatbelt that the woman held out to her, already lengthened to its maximum. Her arm and body and thigh overlapped the skinny lady. The other passengers forced their way to the scattered seats behind them.
“Tell the flight attendant to mark your stub so that you can be refunded for your second ticket. They sold that spot to a standby passenger.” The skinny woman gestured with her left arm, since her right arm was pinned by Emmajean’s shoulder. She told the attendant about it and the attendant soon returned with a document indicating a refund due.
“Thank you.” Emmajean said. “I feel like I’m crushing you.”
“No. This little man beside me is going to see his grandma and he wanted to sit by the window anyway. You didn’t mind scooting over a little did you?”
The child shook his head and turned back to the window.
“Oh, he’s not yours?”
“No. He’s traveling alone, but he’s a very sweet boy.”
The plane taxied and lifted into the sky.
“I’m afraid you’re very uncomfortable,” Emmajean said.
“No, I’ll be honest. I like to sit next to heavy people on planes because I’m always freezing and large bodies give off lots of heat.”
“You’re so lucky. I can only imagine how wonderful it would be to freeze instead of bake.”
“Well, no.” The skinny lady lowered her voice so much that if Emmajean had not been very near, she would not have heard. “Being thin isn’t always pleasant.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” she also lowered her voice so that only her seatmate could hear. “I’m on my way to New York for a fat camp.”
“Really? So am I! Not a fat camp, but a diet camp.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “I’m anorexic. I’m trying to get over it. They’re starting a camp session for all eating disorders. My boss told me I could have my job back when I get home. Are you going to the Perennial Bloom Camp? ”
“Yes! My boss told me he’d pay for half and he gave me three extra weeks of vacation.”
The thin woman laughed. “Do you have cabin mate? I’ve been worried about getting someone I liked to live with for the next six weeks.”
“I don’t have a cabin mate. I wasn’t sure I was going to follow through until you told me to sit down next to you. I would have run away if the aisle hadn’t been blocked.
“I’m Emmajane. You have no idea what a relief it is to me to go into camp already having a friend.”
“I think maybe I do know. It’s a strange coincidence. I’m Emmajean.”
Emmajane laughed again. “We must be twins. Separated at birth like the “Parent Trap.” By the end of camp, nobody will be able to tell us apart.”
Emmajean smiled. “Well, I believe in miracles.”
“So do I.” Emmajane nudged her companionably in the shoulder the overlapped hers. ‘We never really know where our blessings will come from, do we?”
The Bargain
March 17, 2012Saturday Morning Short stories: The Spot in the Middle
March 11, 2012“Can I lie on it?”
Arrrrgggghhhh
February 21, 2012Safety vs Wing-spreading
February 9, 2012A shallow irrigation channel ran in front of our house in Utah. Sometimes the shallow ditch would run with cold, clear water from the Provo River. I don’t think it was ever more than 12 inches deep, and as a three-year-old child, I asked if I could “go swimming in the ditch.” My dad was doing something outside and he said okay. I put on my little pink bathing suit and enjoyed lolling around in the gutter, (a pleasure I have never relinquished?) The tiny current propelled me across the front of our yard, and it almost DID seem like I was swimming, walking along with my hands on the grassy bottom. On that day, I don’t remember that any of my older brothers were out with me, but many times before, I’d seen them let the current carry them through the culvert that run under our driveway. From my low vantage point, I could clearly see the headspace through the culvert and since they considered it a mark of bravery to go under the driveway, I decided to do it too. I was much smaller than they were anyway and felt not one qualm of fear.
The problem arose when my Dad checked on me just AFTER I’d gone into the culvert under the driveway. He called me, I answered that I was under the driveway. “Are you stuck?”
“No.” I also wasn’t in any hurry. Eventually, I floated through and my Dad scooped me out of the water. He made me go in the house! He said I had done something dangerous. But it seemed to my three-year-old reasoning that “swimming” in the current on the grass and “swimming” through a culvert with ample headspace for a tot my size were pretty equal if there was any danger. (Of course now that I have the perspective of an adult, I see it differently.)
A similar incident occured shortly after we moved from our home in the high desert of L.A. county to the tall pines of the Black Forest in Colorado. Brian was five and he said he was going to climb a tree. I told him to hang on tight. The next thing I knew, Brian was fifty feet up, perched in a pine tree. He called down that he could see Pike’s Peak.
Just then, Jeff came home from work. “Look at the little red squirrel in the top of that Pine tree,” I said. When it registered with Jeff that the squirrel was Brian wearing a red sweat shirt, his impulse was to command him down, but agreed with me on second thought to let him do it his own way. He was a wirey, very strong fellow and I knew that his instinct would warn him away from using a branch that wouldn’t hold his weight. He called out all the things he could see from up there, (Like Yertle the Turtle?) and finally, climbed down as readily as he had gone up.
I admit that when he posts videos of himself running down rock cliff faces and climbing sheer mountains (or descending into caves.. .oh my!) my heart quales. But better for him to find his limits, to know how high he can soar than to keep always physically safe. The only broken bone he’s had occured when a neighbor boy deliberately rode a skateboard into him. (We won’t mention frostbite here, since that would weaken my arguement).
It’s a line that as a parent we are constantly prayerfully, thoughtfully seeking. My dad was right to forbid me from the culvert. I did not perceive the dangers, but they were not only very real, but very likely. What if my bathing suit had snagged and I couldn’t get free? What if the sluicegate upstream was opened wider, even accidentally?
Life is complicated. Parenting is complicated. How could we do it without the guidance of the Holy Spirit?
Are you a prepper?
February 1, 2012It’s short for preparer. Preparing for gas prices to be too high for truckers to be able to afford to haul food to the grocery stores. Preparing for a drought that first makes meat and dairy prices go up up up and then grain prices (breads and related products) go up up up, and then fresh produce becomes food for the rich. Have YOU noticed any of these trends when you go to the grocery store?
If you’re a beginner, start with staples your family eats. If you must buy food that is more basic than you usually prepare, that’s okay. Flour, sugar, oats, beans, pasta, rice and powdered milk are good basic foods. Be sure you have lots of salt on hand. It’s cheap and makes all the difference in most basic foods. Try simple recipes using the basic, easily stored food. You’ll find that making the recipes printed on teh packages will guide you in what else you need to store to make foods most enjoyable.
Store some water. The two liter soda bottles are made of the right kind of plastic for long term storage. If you store them somewhere that they might freeze, be sure to allow a few inches of headspace at the top.
Did you know that you don’t have to be Mormon to buy large quantities of staples like wheat and milk, oats etc at the LDS Bishop’s Storehouse? They have facilities for you to package it for long term storage too. It’s very reasonably priced, too. Find the phone number online. Mormons have been told to be prepared for emergencies and famine for years.
Save up an emergency fund. Dave Ramsay is the super-guru for financial wisdom. Get his book and follow it. It will bring greater peace even if you do nothing else, I promise. As you enter the saving step, save some of that in food storage.
If you have access to a few square feet of dirt, grow something good to eat in it. A soil mix of one part spaghum peat moss, one part (aged) manure and one part topsoil is a good basic recipe for vegetables’ soil. Green beans and squash are fairly high yield and and dependable crops. Tomatoes might take a little practice to find the best variety for your climate and soil conditions. It’s almost time to put the onions, lettuce, spinach and other cool weather crops in! Once you’re started, add manure every year and work it into the garden soil. It’s like the frosting on the cake. It makes all the difference.
It isn’t hard to be more prepared each week. Just do a little something every time you have opportunity. Invite your neighbors to do it to. Plant fruit trees, if you have room. Make it fun. Make it a game or a competition. I’ve been surprised by the huge upsurge in interest for “prepping”.
I hope you’ll want to be a prepper too!