Another Week in Paradise

The settling in continues as I prepare to get rid of even more stuff! I'm loving this minimalist thing I have going. It's so much easier to clean without tons of dust catchers around. Plus my condo is not that large and what I can display, I want it to be things that have meaning to me.

Work is going great. I am becoming more immersed in the work done in my unit and I just love it.
My Team members have been great--showing me around the various sites I need to complete my work. And my manager seems to really take in interest in my work and what's going on in my life.

Whichever planet was retrograding, I hope its gone direct now. I think it was Mercury. This week has put a hurting on my charge cards. First, my home computer died so I replaced that -- Hello VISA-

Then I kept seeing water on my lanai and could not figure out where it was coming from. I kept hearing water somewhere but couldn't pinpoint it. I called a plumber because it got worse in a HURRY.   VISA once again.

Plumber says my pipes to the water heater are bone dry but believes the leak is in the slab. WHAT?
So I call this company called IFINDLEAKS (really) and they come out with their sonar/ultrasound equipment and shortly thereafter inform me that the leak is definitely in the slab and it's underneath the water heater. GREAT. Here's my VISA and today it is not everywhere I want to be.

I was forced to turn off the water completely or the lanai would have flooded into the next condo's bedroom. So, I would turn it on, dash around like a maniac and take care of my water needs and then rush back out to turn it off. So fun.

The plumber gets the ultrasound report and shows up Friday morning with 2 helpers carrying a jackhammer and some other large equipment. OMG  They first tried jackhammering the concrete near the water heater. But that didn't work because the leak was too far under it. Of course, it was.  So they proceed to cut the copper pipe, drain the water heater and remove it. Then more jackhammering. They got painfully close to the outside wall of my house but finally located it. As they turned the water off and on to locate it, they told me it was spraying out of the pipe like a garden hose.

Now the hole in the pipe could not have been more than 1/8th of an inch. They thought at one point a small piece of concrete had been resting on that little piece of pipe. AND if concrete touches copper pipes it will wear the copper away. Who knew?

New pipe installed, slab cementing complete, water heater moved back in, pipes re-soldered and water reconnected. Next step: VISA sigh. I know it could have been a lot worse and the leak could have been inside my house, but still....... I also was told that overall the pipes are in great shape and that this was not expected to be a recurring event.

So, I finished my day at work and joined my new neighbors at a local establishment for adult beverages--several and a great dinner of steamed clams and blackened grouper. YUM  Once again--VISA--but this happened to be a place I wanted to be.

Hopefully, I can put the Visa away for a long, long time.
Here's hoping the planets are now aligned properly and next week is much better for my finances.

jilly