water...

What is it with me and water at Christmas???

Last year it was the ongoing saga of the broken hot water heater (which actually started a year ago yesterday)... this year it's fortunately a step removed from me personally... but still...

I was getting dressed this morning and happened to be standing in the lounge room when Random Visiting Brat (visiting the folks in the apartment next to mine no less) kicked or hit or did something to the tap in the courtyard, which frankly has been on it's last legs for some time now, especially because the other Random Brats keep playing with it, knocking it, bending the pipe and suchlike.

And the poor copper pipe couldn't take any more... it broke, right down at the base where it goes into the concrete... and started spray water EVERYWHERE. Did the adults who belonged to Random Visiting Brat do anything about this? Did they report the broken pipe to the office... no... one of them bent the pipe down so that the spray of water was lessened, and then they proceeded to all go out. In the mean time the pipe was still oozing water, although at a much slower pace, all over the place.

So after going through my repertoire of profanity and calling them all the names I could think of, I trundled off to the office to report the broken pipe. Nice Office Boy was very appreciative and called the plumber out... who duly came and essentially snapped the pipe off at the base before hammering it down so that it wouldn't leak until he could come back next week and make a proper job of it... unfortunately that's going to require all the water to be drained out of the pipes in all the apartments so that the water will stop flowing out of the pipe (I know, because I went out and spoke to him).

And all the water dried up and everything was well with the busted pipe.

Then the Dumbass Neighbours and Random Visiting Brat came back. And I watched them all as they came back into the courtyard... not one of them (other than the Brat) actually looked at the pipe. Which, in the general scheme of things, was unfortunate (the fact that Brat looked at the pipe), because he was running around in the courtyard a little while later and went over to investigate his earlier handiwork... which he then proceeded to kick and poke...

And suddenly the dry concrete wasn't dry anymore... the pipe was oozing water very slowly.

So I muttered to myself again and went back to the office to let them know (and it took all my selfcontrol NOT to yell at him on my way past)... only Nice Office Boy had gone home and Pleasant But Essentially Useless Office Girl was in... which was a pain, because then I had to tell the whole story again... and although I kept urging her to call the plumber, she hasn't (although she does seem to have gotten the water to stop for the most part... I think she ended up packing the area around the pipe with dirt or something)...

She came back to take a look at the pipe with me... and just as we got there, the Dumbass Neighbours and their Dumbass Visitors were just leaving again... and they just swanned out past us without acknowledging anything... Grrrrrrr...

If I come home tomorrow and find a pond or swamp or fountain in place of my front courtyard, I'm not going to be a happy camper...

People suck!

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