The life of an immigrant is filled with milestones. Today was the very first time on this continent that I’ve had to have a plumber come to my place.
Now I will have to get over the ridiculously high charges. Did you know that the cheapest plumber in town charges almost as much per hour as a highly effective and very busy psychoanalyst?
Plumbers are expensive, which is why I try to save them only for things that a quick trip to Hoe Depot won’t fix. What did you have him do?
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He had to change a cartridge in the shower. The handyman tried doing it earlier but it got stuck and we were afraid we’d break the whole thing if we pulled any harder.
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OK, I have those kinds of faucets in my home. I went to a local plumbing supply store to find out what I needed, and the owner was kind enough to lend me the two tools needed to do the work. I had to do 2 faucets, and the replacement cartridges were $65 each. With the right tools, it took me about 30 minutes to do both faucets. One tool is the extractor. Sometimes, when the cartridges come out, they can leave an outer casing behind. The second tool is basically a fat cone that wedges into the outer casing and brings it out.
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I observed the plumber as he did it, so maybe next time I will be able to do it myself.
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Naw, its Farmer Vic. Although I wonder how many nicknames Home Depot actually has.
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My figuring is that plumbers is a skilled job that requires years of training to do well. It’s also something that is a challenge (and often involves doing stuff that is “yucky” like toilet plumbing). I’m happy to pay for someone to fix complicated things. I’m very much a “do it myself” kind of a person (I regularly fix other peoples toilets), but if Dr. Google and I can’t figure it out safely, I’m all for paying expertise to, you know, be an expert.
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I’m all about asking questions. In my case, a question resulted in the parts and the loan of tools to do the job. If I hadn’t gotten the tools for free, I would have hired a plumber, because the cost of the tools would have made DIY prohibitive.
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Man, I think you just invented the next app sensation. You need to patent it immediately!
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A conservative literary critic and college professor
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