That was silly

So, today I decided to tackle the kitchen sink. I’ve been sick for over a week and I’m really fed up with being a moaning, hacking couch potato. And the sink was both leaking and failing to drain, so it was high time to clean out and re-set the strainer.

Now, we’ve been having this problem for some time, including several weekends when Mary and I were both home. Why I chose today, when I’m not entirely up to snuff (I’m still sniffing) and no one else is in the house to help will remain a mystery.

Here’s the thing… If you’re going to pull the drain and strainer assembly from your kitchen sink, one of two conditions must prevail. Either,

1.       You need to have a helper; or,

2.       You need to have a tool called a strainer wrench, in addition to the strap wrench you use to turn the locking ring.

I had neither a helper nor a strainer wrench. Which means I spent about an hour trying to grow a third arm or alternatively, find some way to jam the strainer in place so that it wouldn’t just spin while I tried to free the locking ring. Note for those of you who might try this in future – long screwdrivers, duct tape, the handle end of a channel lock wrench and an old butter knife are all equally and utterly useless for this task.

It’s entirely possible I created several previously unimagined expletives this afternoon. I’m proud of a couple of them but not proud enough to share them here.

I blew about an hour before I headed off to the hardware store, tail between my legs, for the right tool. Of course, by then I’d bludgeoned the existing strainer out of round, so I had to buy one of them, as well.

There’s an old saying to the effect that nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.

The job I did today should have been foolproof.

Ahem…