Megan and I took a little vacation down to Disney World this past week and it was an exhausting past week! From trying to find a cheap motel to crash at last friday night after driving down (finally found 1 smoking room at a crappy pay by the week hotel at 2am...) to the 120,000 brazilian teenagers that swarmed the disney resorts (and again stayed up to 2-3am...

Well, we get a call on Monday evening from my parent's who went by to pick up the mail and check the house. Turns out TN American Water said my house had a leak cause the meter was just a-spinnin! Dad shut it off and said the house looked ok. It must be in the yard- Awesome! At least the house wasn't damaged.

We drive back on Thursday and get into town about 9:30. The A/C won't work and the water has been turned off. Turn it on- yep it leaks somewhere...but where I start digging some test holes trying to find where the pipe is. ITS DEEP! I give up around 1:30am (hey, I'm used to staying up all night after the brazilians knock on every door as they walk down the hall...)

I get up an rent a backhoe, have to have a full-sized truck which my frontier is not, so I borrow my dads. Get it home and start playing...er... I mean digging. I figured I would just run a completely new line from the house to the meter and be done with it. As I'm digging, my neighbor comes over and offers me a cold one so I stop and we talk. He mentions the gas line and a discussion over which way that might run ensues. I decide to start at the other end since I was getting close to where it *might* be. I call 811 (call before you dig). Its state law that you must call before you dig. Apparently its also state law to call 3 DAYS before you dig. They'll locate my gas line by next wednesday...

Screw it, I keep digging. WHEEEEEEESH!!!!! then the smell of Doritos. Awesome. I hurriedly shut the machine down, and leap away. Throw the hat, cuss and finally call 911. Three fire trucks show up and an hour later the gas company shows up. They get it seal off an repaired.

Alan drives by, honks and turns around. I tell him the story and he immediately knows what's wrong with the A/C. He tells me what to do and call him in the morning. I'm too tired to fix it right now and I've got a portable a/c in our bedroom for the night.

Anyhow, I finally took a shower 22 hours and $284 (of my dollars) later. It only took my dad's truck, the 3 responding fire units and two gas company guys to solve one of my problems! I'm beat and I'm going to bed..

My yard:

I feel your pain.  Sc

I feel your pain.  Sc

I bet you did. You could have ask Nick in person and compared notes as his young ass and back hoe flew over the "Triangle" like Saturn 5 rocket

Happy to report that everything is done. I filled in the ditch (carefully around the gas line) and took the backhoe back to the rental store. I rewired the A/C unit with the advice from Alan (he was right, the terminal I used last time wasn't high temp and it blew up! good thing it didn't happen when the air was full of gas...). So I am back inside ready to take a shower in the a/c 

Then I'm going to load my canoe up and go putt around the lake for a while, enjoying the last two days of my vacation.

Oh and it turned out to be $297 after fueling the backhoe back up. Still not bad for the projects I ended up fixing! (for now...)

$181.XX for the back hoe rental
 $93.XX for the PEX pipe and all the fittings I thought I needed
 $9.XX for the fitting I really needed (and a snickers bar  )
 $13.XX for diesel for the machine.

I think I know what I'm doing. I mean, I called before I dug... I just didn't wait 

Like I said "Damn the torpedo's Full speed ahead".   Canoe    With your luck, make sure the bilge plug is installed,Wipe off your periscope , charge your cell phone and alert the Coast Guard that you are on the way.    Oh, Have fun.

I am surprised it takes that long. 3 days? We get locate tickets in all the time at work and usually have them done within 24 hours.

We came back from the lake and the gas line was marked... go figure!  It is about 12 inches to the lefy of my trench until it turns a 90 back to the house. Oh well. I got a voicemail from someone doing a damage report... can't wait to call back on that one

And the for the next Tech session...

Saw a commercial this morning, Nick about making the 811 call before you dig....



Thought of you....