I hate plumbing

As the keyboard floats by again on its circuit through the dining room on its way to the sink hole in the kitchen floor, I have just a few moments to record for you the fact that I hate... no despise... plumbing in all its forms.

That is not in any way to denigrate that portion of people who have dedicated their lives to the pursuit of professional pumbing, of course. I have grown in admiration of these folk. I am speaking only personally and from my very limited but, unfortunately, most recent DIY experience.

I have quite literally been baptised in the mysteries of tube cutting, compression joints, non-organic olives and faulty stop cocks over the last few days. I have found that I could not cut a piece of pipe straight if my life was to depend upon it. I have wrestled with brass fittings and adjustable wrenches, stubborn copper pipes and infuriating bends and angles. I have literally been thrown in at the deep end.

As the lapping around my ankles grows more insistent and I really should be thinking of carrying the television up the stairs, I should like to give you my few DIY tips and observations for home plumbing while I can still think of them. They are:

1. You can never have too many lengths of copper pipe. The first time you bend one into a facsimile of a novelty drinking straw by accident you will know this fact is true.


2. You will always attract helpful people while sawing copper pipe in the back of your car at the local DIY store. When I say "Helpful", I mean "trying to be helpful." The first man who grabbed the end of the pipe and held it as I was sawing it so that we might close the boot was indeed quite helpful. If he'd stuck around until I sawed the ends off the other two lengths of pipe, it would have been even more helpful. "Bend it," was the advice of the second helpful passerby. He proceeded to throw his purchases into the boot and bend the last foot of the second pipe I was sawing to demonstrate how useful his advice was. Quite apart from being left with a pipe whose last few inches were bent into uselessness, I was then unexpectedly involved in sifting through the purchases which were mine and the purchases which were his. He left, contentedly, with (I think) only his own goods. Herself stubbed out her ciggy and got out of the driver's seat to hold the final piece of pipe. I don't think I could have benefited from a third plumbing Samaratin. "Swallow it," he might have said. And by that stage I might have tried.


3. Never trust a compression joint, nor written advice on how to make one. I took to heart the article which off-handedly advised one not to turn the nut too far as this might flatten the pipe and spent two days fixing leaks while awaiting disaster if the wrench actually tightened anything.


4. Metric and Imperial measure aren't the same. Witness my fancy taps and the Frankenstein's laboratory in the cupboard beneath the sink.


5. Cheap and cheerful waste kits are neither cheap nor do they lead to much cheer. You should find a big bag of O-rings and keep them handy. The ones which come with the kit are made of regurgitated winegums dipped in starch.

Tomorrow, if I can lasso it as it circles the paired animals on the slowly sinking chipboard ark, I shall install the dishwashing machine. I am so looking forward to it already.