Posted
by Misty Nuckolls
July 12, 2006 at 2:52 p.m.
Aaarrgghh! Sewer flies!!!
That's what was infesting our goddamned house! Sewer flies! I knew I'd never seen bugs like that before!! That also explains why our house had been smelling like rotting garbage two hours after I'd cleaned.Okay, to backtrack a bit. In the basement of our townhouse there is an open pit in the concrete floor, about 18" to a side and square, that is usually filled with murky, evil-smelling water. Submerged in said quagmire is a rusted, tilting hulk of pumping machinery that looks as though it's been salvaged from a shipwreck. All I know is, when it rains a lot, the water that comes through the cracks in the foundation flows into that hole, and the pump squirts it all out into the backyard about two feet from the "patio" door. Also it does this when I use the washing machine. I'm not sure who originally designed this complex's plumbing, but I hope to God that said person is never in charge of installing something really vital, like my brakes.Anyway. Lately there have been a lot of strange insects emanating from inside that scary pit. Too big to be fruit flies, and too little to be black flies, but they were fucking everywhere. We started getting really anal about taking the trash out and cleaning the catbox, and it's not like we were filth pigs to begin with. We dumped like a gallon of bleach in there, thinking the water was stagnant and breeding larvae. Nothing. I finally manage to get in touch with my rental agent (landlord, whatever--whoever it is that manages the complex for the owner, who is the voice of the Professor on the Power Puff Girls. [I shit you not][1].), who sends a plumber to take care of that and my garbage disposal.So the plumber, he comes upstairs shaking his head and scratching under his ballcap. "Well," he says, "I think I figured out what your problem is. You're not breeding bugs in that well, they're coming in from the sewer.""You're saying those flies are coming from the sewer? Like the shit-and-albino-alligators sewer?""Yeah, we call 'em sewer flies." That's one of the most logical statements I'd heard all day. It turns out that whoever installed our sump pump decided to try a little experiment. The outflow for the sump pump runs directly outside and dumps on the back "lawn". This remarkable plumbing innovator decides to put in an open pipe, with no valves or u-bends or anything, directly into the sewer line, as a backup in case the sump pump failed (at least, that was my plumber's opinion, and he seemed pretty damn competent.) Because, you know, running the actual sump pump outflow line, with, like, pressure and stuff, into the sewer instead of the lawn would be stupid, I guess. Problem is, the pipe just being there and small and badly-placed, no water will flow to the sewer from the pipe, but the pipe is a handy and efficient means of conveying sewer gas and swarms of disgusting insects into what is sometimes laughingly called our "residence". However, My Hero Mr. Nameless Plumber With The Creepy White Panel Van capped off the offending pipe, chuckling to himself at varying intervals as he did so. I suppose this is sort of the plumber's equivalent of having to pry a 3.5 floppy disk out of someone's CD drive, but hey-it wasn't my stupid fuckup. Another very nice thing about my plumber---he wore overalls. I think this should be adopted as the standard uniform for plumbers worldwide. Plus, he put the cleaning supplies under my kitchen sink back much more neatly than they'd been thrown in there originally. I think he was genuinely grateful and more than a little suprised that I'd spent yesterday morning elbow-deep in disgusting muck and broken glass. My own part of the operation took much longer than necessary, because the electrical cords on garbage disposals are very, very short.Let me explain. I am deeply, traumatically terrified of garbage disposals. Oh, I can bring myself to use one, but they really, really creep me out. I read "Firestarter" when I was eight, and have never quite gotten over the part where the dude sticks his hand in his garbage disposal and turns it on.So anyway. In order to fish an obstruction out of the garbage disposal, I have to not only have it unplugged, but I have to be able to physically see that it is unplugged. At this current residence, that's not possible unless someone is holding the cord and plug out of the cabinet beneath the sink.Now, you may say that it's negligent mothering to bribe my not-quite-two-year-old into standing inches away from every poisonous substance in our household and waving an electrical plug around like a sparkler, but in times of war and appliance failure, people do things that in peacetime, they're not exactly proud of. And that's all I'm going to say about that.I think I know what went wrong with the garbage disposal, though. Among the eighteen bazillion pints of semi-ground, partially-fermented rice and saag and mac'n'cheese I manually extracted from that disgusting hole, there were also several suspiciously shot glass-shaped shards of glass. Well, dammit, they're really small. It's a mistake anyone could've made. Anyway, although I did manage to determine that the disposal's motor was shot after clearing the blades of obstructions, I now have a new #2 spot on the Top Ten List Of Things I Will Never Do Again, bumping "needle drugs" down to #3 but leaving "sex with my ex-husband" still holding firm at #1. And thus concludes the Grossest Week Ever, and it's only Wednesday. But I have many things to be happy about. My house is no longer infested with sewer flies, and I haven't smoked yet. On the other hand, MY HOUSE WAS INFESTED WITH SEWER FLIES. I am so utterly disgusted with this that I can't even begin to get over it. If anyone out there would like to donate to a poor blogger's mental health, I'm taking contributions of whiskey. I'm either going to bathe in it and scrub my skin raw until I feel clean again, or drink enough of it that I forget most of this past year, including the fact that my house was infested by sewer flies. Either way, it's gonna be a while before I get un-freaked. [1]: http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2003/jul...
Comments
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ladylaw (Terry Bush) says…
So, have you heard the baby say "G** Dammit" yet??? Cause I sure did!! LOL.
Seriously, I'm sure glad you got this fixed. Do some research on it, because I'd not be surprised to find out that there are serious health concerns about the situation you were living in for a year. If you want, we can contact the KDHE or local Lawrence health officials!!! If/when your landlord decides to keep 100% of your security deposit and wants even more $$ out of you, it won't hurt to have a health dpt. officials' letters on hand about the lack of proper sanitation in the place!!
altheasus (Althea Schnacke) says…
Eww. "Sewer" and "flies" are two words that shouldn't go together when describing the accidental state of your house
alm77 (anonymous) says…
"Now, you may say that it's negligent mothering to bribe my not-quite-two-year-old into standing inches away from every poisonous substance in our household and waving an electrical plug around like a sparkler,"
You totally made my day. One eye on Penny, one eye on electical plug, one hand gingerly placed amonst glass and eww. You are my idol.
ladylaw (Terry Bush) says…
hey...just a thought....now that he capped off that pipe, that did not apparently work anyway, where is said overflow going to flow?? In other words, is someone coming to rectify the system you have now?? Or are you going to continue having filthy back-up sewer water in your basement from time to time??? That surely can't comply with city health codes??
fletch (anonymous) says…
"I suppose this is sort of the plumber's equivalent of having to pry a 3.5 floppy disk out of someone's CD drive, but hey-it wasn't my stupid fuckup."
That just made me snarf up Dr Pepper through my nose.
beatle919 (Marcy McGuffie) says…
Holy fuck - I've never met anyone else who read "Firestarter" at a young age (I was 11) and is freaked out by garbage disposals as a result. My mom can't turn hers on with me around without a spazz attack from me. Wonder how many others have the same issue due to Stephen King's mind...
You poor thing. Ya can't even smoke to help relieve the stress of the nasty bug infestion. Hang in there! Alright?
clayhill70 (anonymous) says…
As a proud owner of two sump pumps, may I recommend that you extend the outflow hose by your patio another three feet. Tends to help keep from pumping the same rain water out of your basement over and over. Very important to keep this hose away from your houses foundation. Because of the pressure involved it wouldn't hurt to put a brick on the end of the hose.
Since your plumber capped off the sewer your washing machine will also be discharging out the sump pump outflow hose. There are codes which don't allow this "grey water" to be discharged anywhere but into a public sewer, but thats your landlords problem not yours, though that area will remain wet most of the time because of doing laundry. I don't think it will cause a health problem because alot of people use this same water to irrigate their gardens
Ladylaw is right. Great ammo against a landlord trying to keep your deposit.
mitzibel (Misty Nuckolls) says…
The washing machine has *always* discharged through the nasty sump pump pit, ever since we moved in. It's why we are unable to have anything but a concrete slab surrounded by mud for a backyard. In fact, I think that *several* units' sump pumps discharge through that same hose, seeing as how we're the only tenants with a grey water reservoir in our backyard. The area in question is always wet and swampy and not a goddamn thing will grow there--including narcissi and hydrangea!! Hmm, I wonder if sic-ing the health department on my agency will do any good---I requested a new screen door this week, since ours is busted. Our landlady asked, "And how did the screen in the door come to be missing?" I replied, "Because when we moved in it was hanging in shreds and scraps and I tore those out because I didn't want our toddler to put an eye out."
"Oh, so *you* destroyed the screen door. . . ."
And I'm not even going to get into the battles we're fighting about the leaking roof and ensuing mold/mildew infestations (have you ever heard of Huggies baby wipes molding past use or recognition within a week of purchase?)and collapsing ceilings. My husband wants me to track down my former hacker friends and have them rig up M&M Rentals' site to play a Muzak version of "In The Ghetto" whenever the site is accessed---Gus, where the fuck are you, man?
mitzibel (Misty Nuckolls) says…
alm--glad I could make your day. Honestly, it truly felt like one of those moments that *define* your motherhood, like timing contractions while picking up the oldest from daycare ;) Luckily, Penny has just learned the joys of counting to 10, so she had lots of fun counting off the number of times she smacked herself in the forehead with the aforementioned plug. Hey, bruises heal, right? And she seemed to be enjoying herself.
mitzibel (Misty Nuckolls) says…
fletch--I used to work tech support for the types of folks who couldn't differentiate between a .com and a .gov address. I could tell you stories that would make you snort obscure scillia through your nostrils, much less over-carbonated soda beverages ;)
mitzibel (Misty Nuckolls) says…
beatle---fuck garbage disposals, how about my entire idea of female sexuality? God bless Mr. King, he wrote honestly and raw-ly about female sexual experiences as he understood them, and God help me, but he understands them *at least* as well as the majority of women who presume to write about them. Yeah, sure, most of it was ugly and degrading and scary and humiliating--what the fuck about mainstream female sexual experiences related (at any point in history, much less the late '90's early '00's) wasn't?!?
Anyways, I'm glad to learn I'm not the only person appliancely-challenged by that cocksucker---from now on I'll put you on speed-dial for GD ER's, and you can do the same, cool?
I haven't been able to make it through a Stephen King novel since about 4/5ths of the way through "Wolves Of The Calla". I'm a big fan of the Dark Tower series, think it a noble and above all else praise-worthy-ballsy endeavor, but I don't think I want to sit down and read it until it's really done. That universe has become almost so real to me, that I can't quite gracefully step from it back into my own with any degree of reliability. I need it all to be laid out for me, in one big gorgeous chunk, for me to gnaw and worry on at my own leisure, to gorge on it and get sick and all stupid Roman vomitorium on it, to be really and truly Gothic and Rimbaudian and a dozen other capitilizations on it, to eat it until I'm sick all over the floor, and then eat the sick and then sift through the sick of that sick until I find half a dozen words which are worth it.
In other words, I'm not big on serializations. I didn't read "The Green Mile" until it was fully published, and I won't progress past my eight-chapters-out position in "Wolves Of. . ." Not until the last of it is in print, or that amazing, brilliant s.o.b. is dead. Sumbitch wrote *so* many truths in his life, in between passages of "ooh, ghosts and vampires and shit", his *real* villains were eternity and loneliness and pointlesness and all that crazy existential shit that really makes a difference, when you're like 12, between "goddammit, I have zits and didn't make flag team" and "fuck them, next year I'll have honed my psionic powers through the study of Buddhism and physics that their very physical bodies will cease to be of consequence."
Anyway. I haven't seen a goddamned disgusting sewer fly in an hour or so. After a week or two of bleaching I should be fine.
Tempus (anonymous) says…
Uh, what part of the Dark Tower series is unfinished?
I must be missing something.
mitzibel (Misty Nuckolls) says…
Oh, crap, they finished it? Shows how much attention I've been paying.
clayhill70 (anonymous) says…
Abandon ship.