Of Lawn Bags and Clogged Sinks

My father has been feeling a lot better since his surgery, so he and my mother visited today and we worked a lot around the house.

Downstairs, after shaving one day, I noticed the sink was clogged. My heart sank. I did not feel like dealing with fixing a clogged sink, especially with water now sitting in the sink. However, I thought maybe if I left the water to sit, perhaps it would drain after a while. Maybe it was draining so slow I couldn't see it draining.

After two days, there was no progress on the draining, so after the weddings Hilary and I went to Saturday, we decided that the sink needed to be unclogged.

Sunday, my father came over, and we practically ignored the sink until they were about to leave. We had filled ourselves up with turkey burgers, so we were content to just work outside in the nice weather. Right before my parents left, we worked on the sink.

With a bucket under the sink, I undid the trap. My father and I were expecting the worse, but we did not find much. The stop in the sink has become stuck, and it would not budge. So, we undid the stop and jammed paper towel down the drain. We used a snake to push the towel through, as it came out where the trap should be and landed in the bucket. The towel was filthy, but it did the trick. After attaching the trap back, the drain is now working at max capacity.

People can finally wash their hands in the downstairs sink!!! WOO!!!

As for the outside, Hilary, my mother, my sister, and my father worked hard outside. We swept the sidewalk, removing all the dead leaves and hacking down some unruly plants. It now looks very nice, and when it rains, the rain will clean away the dirt rather than pool in places.

I removed large portions of the trees between our garden and the neighbor's house. They are all maple trees that have not been trimmed for a while. There were a lot, and I have not cut them all yet, but now we can actually see some of the plants on the outskirts of our garden. Hilary found a fantastic red flower which I'm sure she'll talk all about.

With all the weed pulling we did, the yard waste bin is completely full. There may be a little bit of room for some leaves, but that's about it. Waste pickup is not until Thursday, so I guess it's back to good, old-fashioned lawn bagging.

That container is not small either. We weeded. A lot.