Monday, March 28, 2011

Things you don't want to hear

We all have those phrases that we don't want to hear:

"Sweetheart, we need to talk"
"Dad, where's the fire extinguisher and first aid kit?"
"Can you remember the last time I took birth control?"

This afternoon, I heard a new one:

Ring Ring
DaddyBear:  "Hello?"
Girlie Bear:  "Dad?  It's raining in the basement."
DaddyBear: "Wait, what?"

Not "OMFG DAD!  THE BASEMENT IS FLOODING!!!!eleven!!!!".  but "It's raining in the basement."  No emotion, smooth as silk.  Might as well be telling me that she'd finished her homework and was going outside to ride her bike.

Apparently the main drain line out of the bathroom somehow became occluded with debris of some sort, and the overflow from bathroom fixtures was running through the floor and into the thankfully unfinished side of the basement directly below.

This accelerated my drive home.  Luckily, the prodigious application of plunger, drain snake, cussing, and drain cleaner corrected the issue.  Follow-up application of hot bleach water appear to have kept the zombie apocalypse from originating in my home.

I'm proud of her in that she knew not to panic and to call me rather than try to tear apart the plumbing with a wrench.  But that phrase will definitely go into my list of things I never want to hear again.

7 comments:

KurtP said...

Well, thank Gawd it wasn't something important- like a ZIT-OMG!!!, just the house backflowinnng...

If it happened once it'll happen again, get a plumbing Co. out to inspect your lines.

DaddyBear said...

Just FYI. I blew away a comment to this thread because it was spam. Well, that's a first.

Shannon said...

I learned a long time ago not to have any detectable angst in my voice when reporting an emergency to Papa Bear via phone...not only does it make things worse, it makes things MUCH WORSE.

Old NFO said...

Glad 'calm' was maintained... (more or less)! And no major damage was incurred!

Ruth said...

Its better than a voice mail that says "the chimney's on fire I need you home" click. Which is what I did to my husband a few weeks ago....I then proceeded to not answer the phone because I couldn't hear it ring over the fire engines.....his normal 1/2hr commute took about 20 minutes....

DaddyBear said...

Yeah, a chimney fire would get me to break some or all of the basic speed laws to get home.

Ruth said...

It wasn't deliberate, I just don't always manage to communicate well under stress, I did just fine with the 911 operator! At least it sounds like you've trained that part of he freakout out of her!

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