Doh! Moment...

[nolarefugee]

I was mowing the yard yesterday on the old ('77) wheel horse and while navigating close to a fence, I bumped into a hosebibb that comes straight out of the ground in 1/2" galv pipe. Mowing turned into a plumbing project. Our place is about thirty miles from any hardware store that is open on Sunday, so I had to drive a ways to get the parts. Three hours later and we were back in business.

The plastic is coming from the community well service. The steel is going to the house and everywhere else. There was a tee right there where my hand is. At least I now know where exactly the service comes in...

The worst part was when I was going to turn off the water the wife says, "how you gonna fix that?". I was a little short fused after my goof and snapped back, "gee, I don't know..." with sarcasm. And the kids were asking me when the guys are going to show up to fix the water... I explained that I am the guy...

Anyone else have a similar Doh! moment?

 

[zzvyb6]

Duct tape.

 

[AGGIE00]

My parents tub drain was leaking and found its way through the sheetrock to the utility room below. On Christmas day, before we were to leave and go home, I offered to cut an access window through the side of the cabinet on the other side of the wall so my dad could fix it later. The copper happened to be right up against the sheetrock, so when I cut ever so carefully with a circular saw I cut through the copper. I ran outside to shut off the water, but the valve striped off. Now I'm really panicing. My next plan was to dig down and break the line and move the flooding outside. After a couple minutes of that my wife yelled to me that the indoor rain was hot. New plan is to run to the water heater and close that valve. Valve is calcified and won't close so back to the excavation project. 5 minutes later we have a guiser ouside and am back to the striped valve. After fighting with the valve that is now under water for 5 more minutes I feel a ball valve on the other side of the meter and it shut fairly easily. 5k later I got my parents house all fixed up. Do you have any idea what a plumber charges on Christmas day? Can's say I blame him though.

 

[nolarefugee]

Holy cow! That was a doozy!

 

[rsewill]

My parents tub drain was leaking and found its way through the sheetrock to the utility room below. On Christmas day, before we were to leave and go home, I offered to cut an access window through the side of the cabinet on the other side of the wall so my dad could fix it later. The copper happened to be right up against the sheetrock, so when I cut ever so carefully with a circular saw I cut through the copper. I ran outside to shut off the water, but the valve striped off. Now I'm really panicing. My next plan was to dig down and break the line and move the flooding outside. After a couple minutes of that my wife yelled to me that the indoor rain was hot. New plan is to run to the water heater and close that valve. Valve is calcified and won't close so back to the excavation project. 5 minutes later we have a guiser ouside and am back to the striped valve. After fighting with the valve that is now under water for 5 more minutes I feel a ball valve on the other side of the meter and it shut fairly easily. 5k later I got my parents house all fixed up. Do you have any idea what a plumber charges on Christmas day? Can's say I blame him though.

Expensive lesson!!

 

[EddieWalker]

I have more then I can count. Seems like you where lucky in that you didn't know it was there. I do it knowing its there, but trying to get closer to it then I should.

Nice to hear it only took a couple hours to fix. The really bad ones take days!!!

Eddie

 

[Pete Judd]

All my outside hydrants have treated 4x4's around them set in concrete to keep this from happening, learned the lesson the hard way years ago. My waterline going to the hydrants is 2 feet underground, and I have to go down to the well house to shut it off. Gave me a lot of reason to put the posts in after a couple of times knocking them out.

 

[creekbend]

Everyone has experienced a Doh! Moment at some time in their life. Some are worse than others. Even though some of these moments can result in costly or embarrassing situations, I regard them as a part of life. Tomorrow will be another day. Hopefully a better day.

 

[300UGUY]

Somewhere on this site, I read a line " a bad mistake is one that money won't fix". It has stayed with me for a few years now.

 

[Barton]

Yes, I have had those "Doh! Moments" in the past. They don't seem to happen quite as often as they use to. Probably because, as I'm getting older, I'm not doing as much or maybe I've wised up a bit and am more cautious.

Aggie, I feel for you. Haven't done anything like that, yet.