The Mouse; Plumbing

For those in the know. I work as a maintenance man at a large seminary in the SW. I was called today to a house. It was peculiar because I was to pick up a dead mouse. It was in the toilet tank. (My day job is plumber’s apprentice; and ironically last week I also  picked up two dead cats and as a joke I was asked to kill a wasps nest of wasps.) So anyhoo tonight I walk into this apartment. The toilet I can tell needs a new flapper, I hear  water  leaking into the toilet. I notice the lid is closed, and I raise it…there in the middle of the water is a black haired mouse, with it’s snout barely above the water line. It was treading water. I close the lid. Go back down to the truck and grap a plunger (my scepter). I go back into the restroom, and close the door.  [I was reminded when I was little; and my mother and grandfather told me not to go into the kitchen.  They closed the door and attempted to butcher a chicken].  So I thought what do I do.  I decided and I attempted to drown the mouse, but it climbed into the plunger. So I thought I’d flush  to get more water into the tank and well the guy got sucked down…I ended up flushing a few more times, and changed the flapper which sent more water into the tank, and flushing it out if it got stuck in the toilet.
We have some metallic lined gloves. I think next time I will put those on, and use the plunger and my glove hand to catch the nasty vermin. Or perhaps get a trap of some kind. I think I will start wearing boots all the time at work. Better to stomp them if possible.

Imagine opening the lid of your toilet seat only to see a mouse treading water. Too bad they don’t make a spray that kills them on contact.

Plumbing

Sometimes I go out on Plumbing calls, sometimes I do remodeling work. I used to hate to caulk tubs, but as I become more proficient at it…its a bit therapeutic. First you take your scraper and you clean off the old caulk. Then you run the tube of caulk over the edges after they are clean of course…and with your finger you smooth the caulk over. Some guys use a wet rag to clean their  finger as they are  smoothing over the caulk, other guys just dry caulk, meaning they just wipe off the excess on a dry rag. Some run the water a tiny bit so as to moisten their fingers.  But I sort of found it cool to use your scraper blade over the tub and clean off the gummy old caulk.

I write this cuz I am finding a new found joy in manual labor. Anyhoo, I am teaching the new guys how to assemble a sink. Setting faucets and such. The other day I fixed a leak at my brother’s home in Austin. I bought down my tool box, with some borrowed tools…it was sort of therapeutic…and I guess I saved my brother at least Fifty Bucks. Thats what the plumber charged him for just coming out.  I showed my brother how to use the plumber putty.  Putty reminds me of when I was a kid.  Who’d of thought I would be playing with that stuff well into middle age…I mean I play Cranium but to use putty at work.  I guess plumbing is more than a science, its also an art.