Down the Drain

Some of us may have experienced the event of losing something down the bathroom drain. A favorite earring usually is the case (for women, at least; no idea about you blokes). Mine wasn't so much a favorite, as it was one of my functional ones: A stainless steel stud. While washing up at the sink last night (well, this morning, at 2am), it decided to jump, and no, I have no idea how I managed to encourage it to do that. Zombie-ing around at 2am will do that to you.

So, well, bummer. Especially considering that I've managed to NOT lose anything down the drain since I was like, four. (I used to lose whole toothbrushes down the drain when I was four. That's something only a four-year-old can manage I think.)


My first thought, at 2 am: Dammit! Well, maybe I can get it with a magnet on a string.


My second thought: Um... stainless steel doesn't stick to magnets.


My third thought: I'll ask hubs to help tomorrow.


Then, as I went back to bed, I thought "You know, I really don't need to ask hubs for help, it's just a case of taking off the U-bend and retrieving the earring. It's not going anywhere, it can wait. How hard can it be?"


Apparently not hard at all. In fact, it was easy as pie. Hell, it was much easier than pie, because pie actually takes some skill and effort to make (whoever came up with the phrase easy as pie clearly had no idea what they were talking about).


Now, I've never done it before. I'm by no means any sort of plumber. I knew how to do it in theory, so I hit Google. A quick link later, and I had instructions (gotta love the internet). Turns out I hardly needed those, as when I finally got under the bathroom sink to take a look (and moved all the stuff.... and found a pan to catch the water that actually fit under the sink), I learned that I only had to twist off two PVC rings and out came the U-bend in the pipe, with a surge of nasty smelling water.


I shook the earring out into the pan, retrieved it, and took the section of pipe to the kitchen sink.


It was RANK. And coated with gunk. It was NASTY. Baking soda, vinegar, hot water, and liberal application of an old toothbrush took care of that though. Even got rid of almost all the smell. After that, it was merely a moment spent to slap it back into place and tighten the rings up again.


Voila! I didn't even need a pipe wrench. Go me!