Little Doom-and-Gloom Break

Here's a post I thought about writing over Sukkot. Because I need a break from telling you stuff like BY loves the book Michal Asks Ima About Sirens, and his brothers enjoy listening when I read it to him. And that when I told Husbinator how much BY loves a kids' book about living with rockets, Husbinator said, "Good!" which is exactly how I felt, at least until I realized that I don't want my kid to totally connect to a book that explains what to do during real-life air-raids.

Right, so I won't tell you that. Instead, I'll talk about the water company.

Early one morning of Chol Hamoed Sukkot, while Husbinator was at shul, I got a text from the water company. "Hi there!" the text opened. "Is there any chance you have a leak somewhere? We noticed you're using an awful lot of water..."

"Hm," thought I. "I don't think we have a leak. I hope it's not our boiler in the attic spilling water everywhere... But that's the landlady's problem, so it's not a big deal, anyway. In any event, the attic is Husbinator's domain, as is the entire plumbing system, really. But I love him, and I know that message will stress him out. I don't really care, myself, but I'll have a look around after I finish my coffee. Man, I'm such a good wife."  

So I finished my coffee and had a cursory poke around the house. Nothing. I wandered outside and checked what I was fairly certain was the water meter. Yeah, that dial was spinning pretty quickly. Not that I know how quickly it usually spins, but that spinning made me think I should actually investigate. 

So I went through the house again. No water running that I could see. 

I looked in the front yard. No water. I looked in the back yard. No running water. I looked behind the sukkah. And what do you think I saw? I saw a wet patch on the ground. Hm. That didn't look too bad, but what could have caused a singular wet patch between our storage tent and the sukkah? 

I looked into the storage tent and stepped inside. My foot went, "Squelch." I looked down and took another step. My foot went, "Splash." I found an irrigation pipe under a toy mat absolutely gushing water. I put down the gushing irrigation pipe. I left the tent. I found random valves under the kitchen window. I turned the valves until the water stopped. 

I checked the water meter, whose dials were now absolutely still. I gave BY what-for. Husbinator came home, heard what had happened, and gave BY more well-deserved what-for. Then Husbinator secured the valves with zip-ties, because we know our son and we know just how far what-for goes with him. 

As soon as business hours started, I got a phone call. "Hi there!" said the helpful lady. "I'm calling from the water company--"

I cut her off and thanked her for the automated text. She brushed off my thanks and asked if we had taken care of the leak yet. "Yes," I assured her. "Well, actually," I backpedaled. "There was no leak. Our son made trouble. But we took care of it."

Now that's a useful service. I don't know if the water company here provides that service because they genuinely want to conserve water, or because we're entitled to a huge refund on our water bill if we present an invoice from a plumber for fixing a major leak. Regardless, I appreciate it.