Life Lessons

As I cleaned out my refrigerator, I found some leftover food my Grandmother had given me that had since gone bad in a Prego jar. My first impulse was to throw it away, but then I got to wondering if she had expected me to return the Prego jar.

Lesson 1:

Throw away the stupid Prego jar if this ever happens.

I checked to see if we had a garbage disposal. We have a switch and I flipped it to see if it ran.

Lesson 2:

That one of the switches near the sink doesn't turn on a light is not alone sufficient to conclude that you have a garbage disposal. Make sure to listen for a whirring or humming noise and check your drain for anything that remotely resembles a garbage disposal. If you are about to clog the drain with a jar of meat and beans, don't think you can skip these steps just because your penury of thought regarding the possible consequences of dumping the jar's contents into the sink without a garbage disposal has led you to conclude that it wouldn't matter much anyway. Do this process before you start to dump the jar, not after the meat and beans are already falling.

Once the former foodstuffs had found their way to the sink I tried to rinse it down. A reasonable observer will not be surprised to find that the drain was clogged.

Lesson 3:

Use that little strainer thing before you clog the sink and have to use a pitcher to scoop the water out.

When I realized it was hopeless, I decided to go to the grocery store to get some Drano.

Lesson 4:

All this over a Prego jar? If you're plan includes making a special trip to the grocery store and buying a bottle of Drano after clogging the sink, you should just buy a new bottle of Prego and dump it out. It is, after all, less expensive and less noxious than Drano.

The Drano wasn't working super well, but I did notice that the other sink did drain. Unfortunately, I couldn't get enough water to flow to be sure that the Drano was working. Seeing that the entire clog must have been in the first part of the drain, I took heart and started to poke at it with a knife.

Lesson 5:

If your knife is skinny enough to fall down the drain and you think "hey, wouldn't that be terrible if this knife fell out of my hands and down the drain," don't loosen your grip on the knife.

Once the knife was in the drain, I knew that what had been a minor problem (spoiled food in a disposable jar) had now escalated into a much larger (and more time-consuming problem (a knife, a bunch of drano and rancid food in a very inaccessible section of pipe).

I had earlier noticed that some of the pipe fittings were loose enough to be moved by hand. Oddly, after having fiddled with them before I had managed to tighten them to the point that they no longer felt like they were able to be loosened or tightened by hand.

I undid one and then the other and then redid the one so as not to make a huge mess.

Lesson 6:

Put something in place to catch the water/Drano mix that is going to spurt from the pipe as soon as you loosen it.

Lesson 7:

Don't splash Drano all over your new shirt.

I found a plastic bag and put it beneath the pipe.

Lesson 8:

The following are not very good for catching fluid while plumbing:
empty can of Drano (the opening is too small), grocery bag (they are leaky), Prego jar that you're trying to save (the opening is small and so is the carrying capacity).

Finally I was able to remove the knife and then, with quick bursts of water get the meat and beans to flow through the pipe and mostly into the Prego jar.

Lesson 9:

If you are using a Prego jar to catch the fluid from a drain and the jar gets full of water with chunks of meat and beans, don't think you can empty the jar into the sink you're working on or any other sink whose drain feeds into that same pipe. The toilet works well, but make sure to flush to destroy the evidence (although, what do we put in the toilet besides food after being chewed up and processed with chemicals?)

I then proceeded to rinse out the u-shaped piece of pipe I had removed.

Lesson 10:

When rinsing out a u-shaped pipe, be advised that the water might flow through the pipe and around the sink rather than into the sink, thereby making a huge, watery mess on your kitchen counter.

Lesson 11:

If you are making a huge, watery mess with your pipe, rationalize it by noting that the drain in the sink you are using is not properly attached and that the water that goes down the drain would just drench some Prego jar whose mouth isn't really big enough to catch all of the water, so it is probably better to get the water all over the counter top and microwave instead.

Finally I put it all together and I was done.

Lesson 12:

If you are going to go to heroic lengths to save a Prego jar, pack it carefully so you don't drop it on your way down the stairs.

Lesson 13:

To all my friends, if you ever need help with plumbing, you know on whom you can call: a plumber. Please, never try these things yourself, they'll ruin your day.