In for a penny...in for a pound

Do you ever have an Oprah-esque (not sure that is a word....yet) moment when you can no longer reconcile your version of the truth with the cold hard slap in the face real life reflects back at you? It's like waking up and realizing it is still Monday.  

There you are just living your life and out of nowhere some sort of cosmic epiphany downloads to your brain which forces you to face or accept some new fact or reality. To which I always say, "Thank you real life for interrupting my regularly programmed and most enjoyable sense of contentment." 

I just would prefer to live in a softly lit bubble of fictional reality.  Who wouldn’t?  Truth for the most part is highly over-rated. 

Sadly today, that bubble burst along with a pipe in our bathroom.

Yes folks, my home's terrorist assault has continued and it has now begun to water board us; and by water boarding I mean rotting out my floor boards with a leaking pipe in our shower.  The good news is we were able to discover the problem early when some dingy water drizzled on a friend of ours who had stopped by for a visit.  

If I wasn't before, I am now completely convinced our house is trying to break us or at the very least evict us. If my house was an animal I am certain I'd be advised to have it put down.  I may have said that out loud last night.....do you think I caused this?  

Regardless of who or what is responsible, we are now facing a demo and a rebuild.  We considered hiring a professional to do the work, and then we just laughed and said why pay someone to do something that we can so effortlessly do ourselves?  I mean how hard can it be?  Some new pipe and a bit of soldering and Bob's your uncle.  Realistically, we should be able to knock this off in a day or two and be living the life of non-leakage in no time.  

Now I know what you're thinking, statistically speaking we haven't had the best track record on home improvement projects; but practice makes perfect right?  And we rarely make the same mistake three times. We make similar mistakes a lot but not the exact same ones, because that would make us complete idiots. I feel really good about this.  

These are the things I'm telling myself to try and ward off the mother of all panic attack I sense is about to envelop me.  

On a positive note we have decided to totally change the design of the bathroom. It was entirely too small; not even enough room to swing a cat.  Not that I would, or have ever, swung a cat. (Please no letters). However, for arguments sake, I would assume that if ever the need did arise (to swing a cat) I would be unable to do so.

The new design will require us to bang out a couple of walls and re-plumb a few things....no big deal... just the toilet, sink and shower.  This of course might add a day or two to the projected completion date but you know us... in for a penny, in for a pound.  

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.