Plumbing, Pipes and Neighbor Gripes!

We had a plumber in last week to give us an estimate on some work we needed done. (Long story short – the flipper who sold us the house sold it with “hookups” for a washer/dryer, but what he really should have said is, “I’m a cheap bastard and I used some scrap piping. When you suckas hook up your washer you’ll see that you have a basement sprinkler. Haha! I already have your money.”) Well, while we had the plumber over we figured we’d see how much it’d cost to run water up to the roof deck and re-route the washer dryer hookup. So, all up it’s over 2K and I want to drown myself in the washer that isn’t hooked up. Two grand. 1400 in labor for two plumbers for one day. (That’s without parts…) All I want is water for my tomatoes. Is that too much for a girl to ask? (Is 700/day really, really high for a plumber, or am I just really young?) Well, we’re not risking it and we’re interviewing more plumbers. We think they saw our neighborhood (OK, we don’t live in too shabby of an area) and quoted us ridiculously high. I may live in a nice house, but I can afford this nice house because I’m cheap! Hell – I still drink Lion’s Head beer! I’m classy, but frugal. (Do you want me to rant about how much it’s going to cost to get the roof fixed? I’ll spare you that one. But – it gives us a nice excuse to expand the roof deck at the same time… at least that’s how I make myself sleep well at night.)

The community garden is going well. It’s in a… well… dodgy part of the ‘hood. It’s still prime real estate, but we’ll just say that end of the neighborhood needs some sprucing up. The community garden is definitely an asset to the street. In fact, I’m sure it brings up property values. We also act as really good “eyes” for a largely untraveled alley. Another long story short goes like this: So in back of the garden there is a bit of earth near the alley that became a dog poop wasteland. The garden had a bunch of broken bricks that we had to find something to do with (dug up from the newly acquired lot), so we made a brick “patio” out back. We figured it would discourage bad dog owners from leaving us stinky piles of last night’s kibble. And it did!

I’ve spent many a night toodling in the garden and numerous neighbors stopped to say how nice it looks. All but one. There is always one, huh? He has been on our butts to move the bricks saying it’s just debris and we’re illegally dumping on a lot he’s been maintainging. (He hasn’t – the gardeners have been removing the poo & weeds for the past year. I guess he threw down some mulch last summer and that’s what he considers “maintaining.” When we explained that it was indeed the gardeners that have been maintaining it, he says he’s been ill for a year. Odd, because his garden outside his house looks lovely!) Anyway – he sent a threatening letter saying he was going to contact every city office he could think of to get us fined.

Before: mulch + weeds + dog poo = quiet neighbor

After: patio + no dog poo = neighbor threatening to get the city involved

Dear Lord. Some people take themselves way too seriously. I think it’s a control issue. Maybe he wants to be a community gardener and feels left out of our blissful gardening club? Maybe there is resentment there? Perhaps he just wants to be close to us and wants to care for the section, at least in theory? Anyway – we have a meeting later this week to figure out what the heck we’re going to do.

Other than that – I LOVE the garden. When I get stressed I just walk the short three blocks and spend a few hours weeding. The communal tomato patch has been cleared, beds constructed, and we have planted about 15 self-seeded tomatoes that we dug up from various plots around the garden. We have a meeting/pizza chow this weekend to discuss the anti-brick-man and figure out a weeding schedule/map. There is another abandoned lot to the right of my plot and I’m thinking about planting some guerrilla sunflowers.

Oh – pics to come. I lost the cord that connects the camera to the laptop so blame it on the restrictions of digital. (Or the fact that my house is a complete tip! I must clean, but why clean when I can play in dirt? That’s a no brainer.)