ANT, RUBBER TREE PLANT?

Long Long ago there was a song about High Hopes and an ant moving a rubber tree plant. The whole idea was to not give up. The picture of a small ant moving a big rubber tree plant is one like David and Goliath.



I've always liked a challenge and have turned down very few in this life so when I found out that I had two breaks in the water line to my house, one being under the drive way I decided to save myself a LOT of money and do the water line myself. So with the help of a master plumber I sit out.



Now I stand to save myself a large amount of money because to just bust up the drive way was a chunk of change. NO, I'm not that motivated by cash but I recently lost a dear friend by the name of "Shirley", my 1982 CB650 Night Hawk Honda motorcycle and it is hard for me to justify purchasing another bike when i have to send megabucks on plumbing. Hench, the mega project.



OK, Saturday a week ago I began with some assistance from my son-in-law. I had already dug the area that was needed to take the first step which was "pushing" a 3/4" copper pipe under the drive I want bore you with the reasons for certain materials or my reasoning for using certain methods. I will suffice that "Jerry said" and that's enough.



Now everything should have gone smooth and I would not be writing about hopefully being finished this week but... while pushing the copper pipe I got about 3/4 way and ran into something that would not allow the pipe to go an inch further. This meant another effort and when they say push, they mean push so the fatigue had started to set into my arms. Now you push a pipe with the assistance of water shooting through it, so things were rather muddy now. 7/8's the way to completion and another blockage but after some serious effort we finally broken through that one. Exhaustion had set in on me and considering I had the son-in-law working on his birthday I dismissed him and took a break.



I love my son-in-law but he would be the first to admit that he rides the short bus when it comes to understanding how somethings should be done. He works hard and knows a lot of stuff about electronics, computers, music, conducting... OK, maybe I'm the one that should be on the short bus. Anyway, I ended up going behind him digging the trenches deeper, much deeper. Of course the part I was digging was mostly "clay." That sticky heavy industrial type clay. The kind you have to scape off before you can dig any more. GOOD GRIEF!!!!



Sunday afternoon digging. Monday digging. Tuesday digging. Wednesday digging. Thursday digging. Friday digging and finally some pipe laid. Saturday some more digging and then more pipe laying. Close now! Right? Well, after several chunks of wood (2x6) and several chunks of asphalt, one at least 2'x3'x6", I was ready for the master to connect and me do the back fill.

Now I know that it's not over so I'm waiting for the Master plumber to call and say.... so we'll finish this story tomorrow.