Messy
A little after 10 tonight, heated up some leftovers for dinner—and saw that my kitchen sink was full to the brim with dirty water.
And then stepped in a puddle. And realized the floor was half-covered with dirty water.
Every so often it happens that something goes wrong with the drains here and water from another apartment comes up my bathtub drain, or sometimes the kitchen sink drain. But there's never been this much of it before.
I called my apartment manager's office number, the only contact number I have for him. Got a recording, of course. Nobody at that office has ever yet returned a call of mine (generally have to call when they happen to be in the office if I want any kind of response), but I left a message anyway. I don't have an emergency number for them. The apartment manager's personal number isn't listed in the phone book, nor is the management company that owns the complex, nor the apartment complex by name.
I mopped up the floor, and started to bail out the sink. And started hearing this dripping noise. And looked around, and found that the strip of wood under the oven door was dripping.
I couldn't figure out how there could be water coming from the oven, on the other side of the kitchen from the sink, until I moved something on the counter and realized that the counter was covered with water. When the sink overflowed, it overflowed off the sides first (there's a raised lip at the front), covering the counters with dirty water. The overflow from the counters had found its way down inside a cupboard next to the oven and was dripping out onto the (wooden) floor. When I stepped on a certain section of floor, I could feel/hear the squish of water under the floor.
By this time it was past 11. I called various friends for advice. Sometime around 11:30, I finally decided to call a 24-hour emergency plumber. They were very friendly, but what with putting me on hold, and then having to hang up and call me back a while later, and then the guy they sent getting lost, by a little after 1 nobody had yet arrived. I was falling asleep, and had never been thrilled with the idea of waking up the whole neighborhood by rooting out the drains in the middle of the night. So I called and canceled. Then I put the stopper in the drain, put something heavy on top of the stopper, and turned off all my lights.
Ten minutes later, there was a knock at my door. I tried to ignore it. It came again, louder.
I answered the door. The guy hadn't been told I'd canceled. I told him. He called in. He talked with his dispatcher for a few minutes. Then he handed the phone to me. The dispatcher told me that since I'm in an apartment, I'd really better wake up all my neighbors to tell them not to run the water in the morning, or my kitchen would be flooded.
If it had occurred to me at 10, I could've gone and talked to all my neighbors. I don't know any of 'em, but I suppose I could get over that.
But waking up everyone in my building at 1 am to tell them not to run water in the morning just seemed like too much. I couldn't bring myself to do it. I sent the guy on his way.
We'll see if my kitchen's flooded in the morning. If so, I'll deal with it then.
For now, I'm going to sleep.
And I'll remind myself that it could've been worse: it could've been the toilet.