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Feb. 9th, 2007
the toilet
Feb. 9th, 2007 09:13 pmOr is that the damn toilet? No, it wasn't the toilet's fault. I broke it. But then it was the one who was leaking in the first place...
Thanks for your stories, the other night. I figure some of you are wondering what really happened, so to make a short story long...
The valve was leaking. Water was draining out of the tank into the bowl. I turned off the water one day, and when I got home the tank was half empty. Not an emergency, but something that needed to be taken care of. So one night I took the tank off, and tried to get the valve out. I failed. I expected that a plastic nut could be removed by hand, but that is not the case. So I tried to clean up the valve and hope that helped. I put it back together and checked it the next day. The tank was empty when I checked it after four hours. Not good.
I had to do something. I bought a wrench and a new valve. I took the tank off and set it on the toilet. I couldn't budge the nut. I put the tank upside down in the bathtub. With a bit of exertion (and probably luck) I got the nut off. In order to remove the valve and place the new one, I picked the tank up and balanced it on the edge of the tub. It didn't seem unsteady. I was sitting straddling the edge of the tub, and when I got up, and lifted my foot over the side of the tub, my shoe was caught on the shower curtain. This deflected my leg, and my foot hit the toilet tank, which slid off and fell into the tub. It landed bottom down, with the bolts gouging the tub. Once the bottom hit, the top swung down sideways and hit the wall of the tub, breaking a chunk off of the corner of it. I can not figure out how my shoe was caught on the shower curtain, but there's a hole in the curtain to prove that it did.
Sigh. (Now, I sigh. At the time I let loose with profanity and violent gestures.)
The only damage to the tank was that chunk missing from the corner. The hole starts just behind the flush handle, and goes to just around the corner on the back. Fortunately, the hole only goes down to just above the water line, so the toilet is still in use. It's a little noisier than usual, because of the gaping hole, but at least I can put off the expense for... as long as Cyn can put up with it.
And speaking of holes in tanks, there seems to be a leak in my gas tank.
Thanks for your stories, the other night. I figure some of you are wondering what really happened, so to make a short story long...
The valve was leaking. Water was draining out of the tank into the bowl. I turned off the water one day, and when I got home the tank was half empty. Not an emergency, but something that needed to be taken care of. So one night I took the tank off, and tried to get the valve out. I failed. I expected that a plastic nut could be removed by hand, but that is not the case. So I tried to clean up the valve and hope that helped. I put it back together and checked it the next day. The tank was empty when I checked it after four hours. Not good.
I had to do something. I bought a wrench and a new valve. I took the tank off and set it on the toilet. I couldn't budge the nut. I put the tank upside down in the bathtub. With a bit of exertion (and probably luck) I got the nut off. In order to remove the valve and place the new one, I picked the tank up and balanced it on the edge of the tub. It didn't seem unsteady. I was sitting straddling the edge of the tub, and when I got up, and lifted my foot over the side of the tub, my shoe was caught on the shower curtain. This deflected my leg, and my foot hit the toilet tank, which slid off and fell into the tub. It landed bottom down, with the bolts gouging the tub. Once the bottom hit, the top swung down sideways and hit the wall of the tub, breaking a chunk off of the corner of it. I can not figure out how my shoe was caught on the shower curtain, but there's a hole in the curtain to prove that it did.
Sigh. (Now, I sigh. At the time I let loose with profanity and violent gestures.)
The only damage to the tank was that chunk missing from the corner. The hole starts just behind the flush handle, and goes to just around the corner on the back. Fortunately, the hole only goes down to just above the water line, so the toilet is still in use. It's a little noisier than usual, because of the gaping hole, but at least I can put off the expense for... as long as Cyn can put up with it.
And speaking of holes in tanks, there seems to be a leak in my gas tank.
In the phrase, "ye olde," the word "ye" is an old version of "the." That's probably obvious, but the reason is that the Y is a later, alternate form of Þ, which is the letter thorn, which has the TH sound. So it should really be pronounced with the TH even though it looks like a Y.
The modern digraph th began to grow in popularity during the 14th century; at the same time, the shape of thorn grew less distinctive, with the letter losing its ascender (becoming similar in appearance to the old wynn (Ƿ, ƿ), which had fallen out of use by 1300) and, in some hands ultimately becoming indistinguishable from the letter Y. By this stage th was predominant, however, and the usage of thorn was largely restricted to certain common words and abbreviations.