We have a new dishwasher! It's fancy. And it only took 14 hours to install! Easy peasy!

It all started with the ugly broken dishwasher (and nasty broken garbage disposal) that came with the house we bought. When the house was inspected, we stated that repair or replacement of the garbage disposal and dishwasher were necessary. The seller replaced the disposal and the dishwasher appeared to have been repaired when we closed on the house.

Upon moving into the house, we discovered that the old dishwasher was not repaired; it would happily fill and wash, then refuse to drain. Being the dishwasher novices that we are, we made some half-hearted attempts to fiddle with the standing water in the bottom of the tub, but eventually decided to purchase a new dishwasher. My father-in-law insisted that he could install the dishwasher in a couple of hours. We stupidly believed him, ignoring the repeated warnings of the sixteen year old Best Buy employee against self-install.

Please note, my father-in-law is a great guy. He's funny, he's kind, and he always means well. However, despite his collection of fabulous tools, he's not very handy. I grew up in a house with a terribly frighteningly handy Dad, so this is rather foreign to me. I assume that when a father figure says he can fix something, he can. I would be wrong.

I spent my weekend at work, receiving updates from Frinklin every few hours as to the status of the dishwasher installation:

10am: The old dishwasher is now out on the deck.

12pm: We are traveling to Home Depot to pick up a hacksaw to cut the hard pipe used for the old dishwasher, and to pick up more hose that should have been used.

1:30pm: We're returning to Home Depot to pick up more thread tape.

3pm: We're back at Home Depot, looking for the correct connection for the pipe and faucet.

4:30pm: We're at Home Depot one more time, still searching for the correct part.

At 5pm I arrive home to see my father-in-law walking out the door, instructing Frinklin to put "lots of towels" under the sink to absorb water spurting from a leaking connection. "It'll be fine, I'll be back tomorrow," he yells as he gets into his car.

I freak out and half an hour later send Frinkin on yet another trip to Home Depot to purchase the tool enabling us to turn off the water to the house for the night, reducing the spurting leak to a slow drip.

Fitful sleep ensues and no showers are available in the morning. I return to work and continue receiving Frinklin's updates.

10am: The leak has slowed.

12pm: The air vent is leaking. I need to go to Home Depot and purchase caulk.

3pm: Um, my Dad left and I'm going to reconnect all the pipes to make sure there are no more leaks.

Sunday evening I return home to find a happy Frinklin apparently sucessfully using the dishwasher and monitoring a very slow leak under the sink. Tupperware is used to contain this tiny leak and we high-five, hoping that the thread tape will seal over the next few days and stop the leak. We deem this an acceptable price to pay for having a working dishwasher.

7:30pm: New dishwasher will not drain. Much sobbing and rending of garments occurs.

End of part one. Part two will continue tomorrow.

Posted by: Ensie at 10:09 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 592 words, total size 3 kb.

1 I fear the future.

Posted by: eden at September 13, 2005 08:21 PM (M2PUd)

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