Thursday, November 4, 2010

Gross But Lucky

I walked downstairs yesterday to find my sewer drain had backed up again. This tends to happen about every two years. This year seemed to be a little earlier and I admit I was suppose to have preventative maintenance done last summer but forgot. As I walked downstairs, I silently hoped that I wouldn't find my carpets soaked or my boxes ruined. I was pleasently surprised to find that only one box of books (that should have been thrown away a long time ago) was ruined and the carpet was still dry.

I woke up early this morning and called the rooter company. They agreed to come out this morning so I took the boys to day care and began cleaning the mess in the basement. I had laundry on the floor that had gotten a little wet and of course there was dirt and debris that needed to be cleaned. The odor wasn't pleasant so I found a new air freshner and began cleaning up the floor. The worst to clean was the wet cat litter that had been kicked out of the litter box before the flood hit. In all it only took about 45 minutes to clean which is far better than last time. Two years ago I didn't find the mess until I had given two baths to the boys, started the dishwasher and was running the washing machine. I went downstairs to move the wash when I found water everywhere. That year it did hit the carpet as well as most of the boxes on the floor and a variety of other things. That mess took several hours to clean (mostly drying carpets and shampooing them). This year I was lucky. Next time maybe I will remember to call for preventive maintenance and avoid the whole thing.

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