Toilet Time

I took out the toilet today, not something I was looking forward to. A toilet can be a heavy thing, actually. You don’t really think about their weight so much, these things being pretty stationary. You usually seek one out to do what you need to do, don’t have much occasion to go carting one around. They attach simply enough; you loosen a couple of small nuts attached to long bolts, back them off, unhook the water supply at the tank, and lift the whole thing up and away. Down where it meets the waste pipe, there is a wax gasket—a thing that does a remarkably good job of keeping the muck and ooze and stinky stuff that finds its way into the toilet from leaking around and all over the floor or basement. These gaskets cost a couple of dollars and are renewed whenever a toilet is removed for some reason. I put this toilet—which is fairly new—on a useful piece of strong cardboard and dragged it into the dining room and into a corner. Most of the water was already drained out, and very little leaked from around the bottom.

With only the tub still in place, I was able to knock out the remaining wallboard, having better access to these areas in the confined space. Now I was able to get at the old radiator underneath the window. Still hooked up to the network of heating pipes, it had been many years since anyone had loosened the big steel nuts that fastened the thing to the plumbing. I gave them a few good whacks with my short-handled maul and then applied force with the big pipe wrench I’d bought at one of the Friday sales for ten bucks. The nuts backed off easily, allowing the remaining water in the radiator to spray and dribble out over the floor. The floor will be wrecked and removed anyway, so this didn’t worry me at all. However, the water was leaking into the basement, and I went down to put a bucket in place. What I found was—in all of the places that this radiator could be leaking water--it was raining down all over the new electrical panel I’d paid around two thousand dollars to have installed. I fully expected, as these things go, to hear a gigantic explosion as the moisture infiltrated the vital electrical components and crossed the two poles. I went back upstairs and tightened the fittings, cutting off the flow of residual water. I’d revisit this again, when I could adequately cover the electric panel down in the basement.