Quickie bonus recipe: Cranberry pears

Yesterday morning, Brian and I went out to visit some of the local stores we like to hit whenever we're in Indianapolis. When we returned around lunchtime, his folks weren't home, but his mom had left us a sticky note on the kitchen table reading, "Eat pears!" Apparently she'd bought a bunch of them, and she was concerned that they wouldn't remain in eatable condition much longer.

The easiest way to obey this instruction, of course, would have been simply to take a pear, cut it up, and eat it. I'd had one of them already, and I knew it would taste fine by itself. But as it happened, she had made baked apples for dessert just a couple of nights before, and I'd mused about how this dish would work with pears instead of apples. And the previous night, we'd had a sort of pasta-spinach salad for dinner, accompanied by cranberry sauce, and there was still some of it left over in the fridge.

So, putting those two facts together in my mind, I decided to try experimenting a bit. I cut one of the pears in half, cored it, spooned cranberry sauce into the middle, and microwaved it for one minute on high. I realized this wouldn't really be the same thing as baking it in a slow oven that would give the flavors of the filling time to soak into the pear-flesh, but I figured it would be good enough for a proof of concept.

As you can see, this dish is a little difficult to eat neatly, but it tasted pretty good. A minute in the microwave was enough to heat the pear through and soften it up to the point that it could easily be eaten with a spoon, peel and all. And as I suspected, the flavors of the pear and the cranberry sauce complemented each other pretty well. They'd probably be still better if the pears were cooked slowly with the cranberries, so the flavors could combine more thoroughly. (In fact, it looks like Martha Stewart had much the same idea.) But for a dish I came up with on the spur of the minute using leftovers, it was a striking success. I think there's still some cranberry sauce left in the fridge, so maybe I'll take the opportunity to tinker with it a little more and see if I can improve on it any while still keeping the preparation fairly simple.

Gardeners' Holidays: The Changing of the Garden

The wheel of the year has turned round once again, and we find ourselves at the end of the gardening season. Everything left in the garden has been harvested: the last few green tomatoes left on the vines, all the squash, the lima beans. All that's out there now is the Winter Marvel lettuce, which we hope will survive under the winter snow and give us a second crop in the spring.

So, with all the harvest gathered in, it's time to evaluate this year's crops and see just how they did. And I have to say, it's a pretty mixed bag. A few crops produced amazing yields, while others—including some that have been fantastic in the past—were disappointing.

• Arugula: Meh. We planted four squares of it, and we harvested maybe one bunch from each square. I thought this was a disappointing performance from a crop that used to be one of our most prolific producers, but Brian says there was "lots of it" in the bed; we just didn't get a "second bump" out of it like we sometimes do. It all got picked fairly early on, and then it was gone. So maybe we just need to stagger the plantings of it a bit more so we can spread out the harvest.
• Asparagus: Even more meh. Most of the new crowns we planted this spring in the secondary bed (just outside the garden fence, next to the rhubarb) didn't even come up, and the old bed produced maybe one pound total. Next year, we're going to make a point of buying some new crowns while they're fresh, not the last pickings left at the Co-Op, and plant them in both the new bed and the old one on the south side of the house.
• Basil: We planted something like seven squares of sweet basil and harvested only a couple of good-sized bunches. For a crop that produced so much in 2013 that we had to come up with new ways to store it all, this was a definite disappointment. This was the same variety we've always used, so maybe it was just this year's weather that resulted in the poor harvest, but on the other hand, if this year's weather is the new normal, maybe a new variety would do better overall. I figure we'll give it one more year to see how it works out. On the plus side, the Thai basil we tried for the first time this year produced reasonably well and proved very useful, so we'll definitely expand the planting of that next year.
• Cilantro: Virtually useless. We planted one square and got almost nothing out of it. At this point, it's probably not worth even planting it again, since it hasn't done well for the last several years; as Brian puts it, "If it shows up at all, it shows up and dies fast." And I don't even like it that much, so it's no loss to me.
• Cucumbers: Pretty good—about 36 cucumbers off 8 vines, evenly split between the Marketmore and Cross-Country varieties. However, a couple of the Marketmores came out bitter, so we might go with all or mostly Cross-Country next year.
• Dill: Nothing extraordinary, but we got enough to keep us in dill pickles. So there's no need either to increase or decrease our planting next year. 
• Green Beans: This was one of those pleasant surprises. Not only did our old standby, Provider, give us about six pounds of beans, but after it had stopped producing, we got another two pounds and change off a mystery bean plant that somehow got in among the Provider seeds. We've tentatively identified this variety as a Climbing French bean, so we're going to try picking up a packet of those (Fedco doesn't carry them, so it may mean placing a secondary seed order somewhere else) and planting them wherever we can find room. This year, they ended up taking over the trellis just vacated by the snap peas, so maybe we should try to work it the same way next year.
• Leeks: Pathetic. We were a bit late getting them into the ground (around mid-April) and we harvested only four tiny leeks from two squares planted. We'll try to get them in a little earlier next year, and if the crop is equally disappointing, I think it's time to ditch them altogether.
• Lettuce: Not too bad. Our new Bronze Mignonette variety, which replaced the Tom Thumb Bibb lettuce, gave us six good heads from three squares, and our Summer Lettuce Mix another four bunches or so. The Winter Marvel lettuce has only just started to come up, but we're hoping to get some in early spring, and maybe even during the winter. So we'll probably stick with these varieties for now.
• Lima Beans: We only got about ten ounces altogether, once they were shelled and dried. That's not much of a harvest for eight plants, but then, they're not really taking up much space either, since we only planted them on the three trellis squares behind one of the zucchini plants. So we may as well keep going with them, at least until we use up this year's seeds.
• Marigolds: Not for eating, obviously, but we got nice cutting flowers off them all summer long. I honestly can't tell if they help keep pests off the tomatoes or not, but I'm willing to keep them just for decoration.
• Parsley: The seeds we planted never came up, so we ended up buying some from the Rutgers plant sale. But Brian planted one of them in the herb bed in the front yard (mainly so he could say it contained parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme), and it's still looking green and healthy, even though it's technically an annual. So if it survives the winter, we may as well just leave it there and not bother planting any in the garden itself.
• Peppers: Mixed results. Our Carmen frying peppers, which were such promising newcomers last year, hit the ball out of the park this year, producing 33 big, flavorful peppers from just one plant. Our old Jimmy Nardello frying pepper turned in a satisfactory performance with 12 peppers, but it paled by comparison with the Carmen. And our other two varieties were a complete bust: the Klari Baby Cheese pickling peppers gave us only seven tiny peppers, and the Czech Black, a mild sweet pepper, produced nothing at all. So we'll definitely be planting Carmen next year, but we'll almost certainly drop all the others in favor of new varieties.
• Scallions: I don't have good data on these, since we picked them sort of one or two at a time. Brian says we got a "steady one-to-three-months' supply," so I guess there's no need to plant either less or more next year.
• Snap Peas: We got about three pounds total, which isn't too bad. I'd still like it better if we could start harvesting these earlier than the end of May, though. I keep planting them a little earlier every year, but to get any peas in April we'd have to plant them in February, which is probably pushing it too far. Still, this Cascadia variety is the best producer we've had to date, so we'll probably stick with it.
• Squash: We got six squash off our Waltham plants this year, but only two off the Ponca Baby vines. I'm inclined to think we should just go with all Walthams next year if we want to maximize our production. The two varieties taste equally good, so why shortchange ourselves? (Matter of fact, it looks like Fedco doesn't even sell the Ponca Baby seeds anymore. But there's a new variety called "Little Dipper" that allegedly produces "a ton of uniform tan 2-3 lb fruits," and is disease-resistant to boot. So maybe we should give that one a try.)
• Tomatoes: Another disappointment here. The Pineapple variety, which proved so amazingly productive and tasty last year, gave us only one tomato all season. We can't figure out what went wrong. I guess we'll try it again next year in the hope that it was just a fluke of the weather, but we certainly won't count on it for high yield. The Black Prince was also a bit of a flop, yielding only seven medium-ish tomatoes. On the plus side, the Heinz OG produced plentifully, even if the fruits were a bit on the small side, and the Honeydrop cherry tomatoes proved just as prolific—though not quite as tasty—as the Sun Gold, and much less prone to splitting in wet weather. So next year we might go for a mix of Sun Gold and Honeydrop for cherry tomatoes, while keeping the Heinz OG and Pineapple, and maybe trying one new variety to fill in the gaps.
• Zucchini: We kept pretty well on top of our zucchini production this year, so only one squash ended up growing to baseball-bat proportions before we caught it. We got an adequate but not extraordinary yield from our two plants: 13 fingerling zucchini, 2 small, 4 medium, and 2 large. We might have had more if one of the two plants hadn't yielded to borers as usual, but our strategy of burying the stems in dirt managed to keep the other one borer-free, which is a better result than any other technique we've tried. So we'll stick with this method unless we can find anything better.

All in all, a mixed year for the garden. So there's definite room for improvement next year, which we will explore via the Fedco catalogue on our trip out to Indianapolis. Happy holidays to all, and best wishes for a good gardening year in 2019.

Recipe of the Month: Vermicelli Stir Fry

Although Brian was raised as a carnivore, he's generally had no problem adjusting to a mostly vegetarian household. But there's one thing that he finds kind of annoying about tofu: It generally comes in packages weighing a pound or more. That's too much for one dinner, at least for just the two of us, so every time he cooks a meal with tofu, he ends up with leftover tofu he needs to use up within a few days.

Last week, he found himself in this situation again, trying to think of a way to turn a leftover half-pound of tofu and some miscellaneous veggies into dinner. His usual go-to recipe for such occasions is stir-fry, but we'd already had it recently and I wasn't that enthusiastic when he proposed making it again. So he decided to try something a little more interesting by tossing in some rice noodles with the veggies to make a variant of Pad Thai.

However, when he went looking for the rice noodles, he discovered we had an unopened package of something called "Vermicelli Hot Pot" noodles tucked in the back of the cupboard. We'd bought these noodles, which are made chiefly from peas, ages ago and never got around to using them. So, rather than use up our one remaining dinner's worth of rice noodles, he decided to try putting some of these mystery noodles to good use.

There were no instructions on the package for how to cook the noodles, so he just measured out an amount that looked about right—roughly two thirds of the package—and boiled them until they seemed reasonably tender, about five minutes. Then he drained them and added them to the wok with all the other ingredients he'd already stir-fried according to his usual protocol: a half-pound of broccoli florets, two grated carrots, four or five chopped scallions, and the half-pound of fried tofu cubes that had started the whole thing. Then he seasoned it with soy sauce, sesame oil, and some toasted sesame seeds, and called it dinner.

For such a seat-of-the-pants recipe, this actually worked remarkably well. The "Hot Pot" noodles turned out to have a light, slightly chewy texture, less starchy than rice or wheat noodles, which definitely made a more interesting contrast with the veggies than the white rice we usually serve with stir-fry. Since I've never had this type of noodle before, I couldn't say whether their age had affected their texture at all, but it certainly wasn't a problem. Altogether, it was interesting enough and tasty enough that I went back for seconds—something I seldom do with stir-fry—and was quite happy to lunch off the leftovers the next day.

This dish seems pretty healthy, too. The main ingredients are fresh veggies, tofu, and the noodles, which contain only 99 calories per cup, about half as much as regular pasta or rice noodles. That makes this an even lighter meal than fried rice or even our usual stir-fry/rice combo. And since the noodles contain nothing but peas, sulfur dioxide, and corn starch, this meal is suitable for gluten-free diets as well.

All in all, this was a healthy, satisfying, economical meal that I'd be quite happy to make again. In fact, it seems close to certain that we will, since we've still got about a third of the packet of vermicelli to use up. But even when that's gone, I would consider going back to the H-Mart for more,  maybe even on a regular basis, so we can have this dish on tap as an alternative to our usual stir-fry. After all, the whole point of this Veggie of the Month experiment, back when I started it in 2013, was to make fruits and vegetables a bigger part of my diet, so any recipe that turns veggies into an appetizing meal is one that definitely deserves a place in the regular rotation.

Money Crashers: Free & Cheap College Classes for Seniors

I've often thought that my college years were the best time of my life. Don't get me wrong, there are things about my life now that I love and wouldn't want to give up, including my husband, my house, my cats, and this blog. But there were two great things about college that I've never had at any other time in my life. First, I was living in the same place with all my friends, and we all had pretty much the same schedule, so we could hang out together any time—there was none of this calling and e-mailing back and forth just to find a night we're all free to play games. And second, what we called work back in college was studying—reading books, writing papers, learning interesting things. In other words, the kind of thing I have to make a special effort now to make room for in my schedule alongside all my actual work, the kind I get paid for.

When I've thought about how I'd like to spend my retirement, I often think that what I'd really like to do would be to go back to college, or at least someplace like it, where I could live with all my friends and take classes for my own enjoyment. I'm still not sure if there's a way to manage the first part of that, but I've discovered that the second part—taking classes—is not only possible, but could actually be free if I play my cards right.

It turns out, there's at least one college in every state in the country that allows senior citizens to take classes for free, or for a steeply discounted cost—usually just to audit, but sometimes actually for credit. Most schools have rules establishing that these non-paying seniors can only take classes that aren't full, so they aren't taking space away from full-paying students, but that still leaves lots of fun little obscure classes to choose from.

On top of this, there are "lifelong learning programs" at lots of colleges that are specifically for seniors. And there are even whole retirement communities located on or near college campuses, so the residents can hang out and take part in college activities—sometimes including classes.

I've rounded up all the free and discounted college options for senior citizens that I could find in my latest Money Crashers piece: Free & Cheap College Classes for Senior Citizens (By State & University). I realize, of course, that a lot of these programs will probably have changed by the time I'm ready to retire—but it's still something to look forward to. And for any readers who have reached retirement age already, it could be something to check out right now.

Know when to fix 'em, know when to nix 'em

One of the most basic problems of the ecofrugal life is that nothing lasts forever. No matter how much effort you make to choose things that will last—clothing, shoes, products for your home—they'll still wear out eventually. At some point, you always find yourself facing the same old dilemma: Can I make this last a little bit longer, or is it time to give in and replace it?

Unfortunately, there's no simple rule to answer that question. There are a few general principles that can help you decide, but mostly, you have to tackle the problem on a case-by-case basis. Just in this past week, I've faced this same question three times, and I came up with three different answers: one yes, one no, and one maybe.

Case #1: The worn-out trousers

About two years ago, I reported with pride on how I'd managed to take in the oversized waist on a new pair of pants with a piece of elastic. That repair has held up reasonably well, but unfortunately, the rest of the pants didn't. Within a year, they fell victim to the same ailment that affects all my pants eventually: severe wear in the thigh area, which is a lot harder to patch than a rip at the knee. I attempted to patch them with some grey fabric, and this kept them going for a while, but after another year, the patch itself had developed holes.

At this point, any normal person would have given up on the pants, but I just hated to let go of them right at the beginning of winter when they're the warmest pair I own. So I decided to take one more crack at fixing them by removing the old patches and sewing on new ones. This time I went with black fabric from a pair of fleece-lined leggings, putting the soft and comfy side facing in and the smooth side facing out. I hoped this new patch would be both more durable and less noticeable than the original one. 
I used the same method as before, cutting out two large squares that reached all the way from the crotch seam to the spot where the holes were. This allowed me to stitch them down against the existing seam on two sides, making the seams more secure and a little less noticeable. Then I just whip-stitched them into place around the other two sides. I also went around the edges of the hole on the other side and stitched them down against the patch, so they wouldn't flop around.

Well, I can't say yet how durable this fix will be, but I can say it already looks a lot less obtrusive than the previous set of patches. When I tried them on and showed the patched area to Brian, he said he could barely see it; the only reason he could even tell it was there was because I told him. So I have good reason to hope this repair will give me at least one more winter's worth of wear out of these cozy flannel pants before I have to discard them.


Case #2: The snapped-off toilet brush

You may recall how disappointed I was last year to discover that IKEA had stopped carrying refills for our old toilet brush. This was particularly irksome, because the money-saving and waste-preventing refills were the whole reason we'd bought this fancy toilet brush holder in the first place. We tried to tweak one of IKEA's new replacement heads to fit the handle, but it was too wobbly and eventually snapped off at a the handle joint.

However, since we had a second one of the replacement heads on hand, Brian decided to take another crack at fixing it. He inserted the new head into the handle, then reinforced it with some Sugru polymer adhesive to keep it from wobbling. We expected this to be a short-term fix, but to our surprise, the repaired brush actually held together pretty well, and we actually thought we might be able to make it work at least until the head wore out.

Unfortunately, this week we discovered the limits of this hack. After performing faithfully for about a year, this new brush finally snapped off right at the handle, just like its predecessor. And since we're all out of refills, there's no way to repair it again.

So at this point, our choices are: (1) Go back to IKEA, buy some more of these not-very-suitable refills, and attempt to MacGyver them into place yet again; (2) Go back to IKEA and buy one of their new toilet brush holders, which will work with the new refills, but won't work nearly as well with our bathroom; or (3) Just give up and buy a cheap disposable brush. Of these, I guess option 2 is probably the most likely to work, but I'm not exactly happy about it.

Case #3: The not-so-waterproof boots

About two years ago, I declared with great triumph that I'd finally found the perfect pair of winter boots: a good fit, leather-free, decent-looking, comfortable, warm, and dry. They were a bit expensive at $80, but I figured that was a good deal for a pair of boots that should "see me through the next several winters."

Fast-forward to the start of this winter, and I've discovered that these boots no longer keep out water the way they used to. A week or so ago I wore them outside on a rainy day, and although I did my best to avoid the deepest puddles, by the time I got home both boots were soaked right through—and it took several days for them to dry out fully.

At this point, I could have just dropped another $80 on a new pair, but it hardly seemed worth it if they were only going to last me through two winters. And it was frustrating having to toss them when they were still in basically good condition, with the uppers still intact and even a decent amount of tread left on the soles. As far as I could tell, the part that was letting in the water was the joint between the upper and the molded sole, and it seemed like there ought to be some way to patch that.

So I did a little hunting online and found this page that suggested two ways to deal with this kind of leak in a winter boot: either a urethane sealer or a natural wax-based product called Sno-Seal. The Sno-Seal seemed less hazardous to work with, and we actually happened to have an old tube of it on hand, but it also appeared to be designed specifically for leather boots; a few sites said that it could actually damage a a nylon boot like this one.

The product recommended most often for synthetic boots was called Aquaseal SR, so we headed out in search of a tube. We eventually managed to locate a similar product, Aquaseal FD, at Dick's Sporting Goods, and I headed home to try it out. I cleaned the boots carefully and applied the stuff kind of like caulk, squeezing out a bead along the seam and pressing it in with a gloved finger. So far I've done the insides of both boots; they'll need about 24 hours to cure, and then I'll do the same along the outsides.

So it's too early yet to say how well this fix will work. However, it only cost $8 to try it, and if it enables me to get even one more winter's worth of wear out of these boots, that will be enough to bring their cost down from $40 a year to less than $30. Plus, it will save me from having to go back to the drawing board looking for that elusive pair of truly durable winter boots that will actually fit both my feet and my lifestyle.

Our plumbing comedy of errors

Last October, I mentioned that we'd been without water at home for a couple of days, and promised to tell you later about how it came about. So, as promised, here's the whole long, strange story. I referred to it in my earlier post as a "bizarre string of circumstances," but the phrase my husband used in relating the story to his parents was "cascading clusterfuck"—and after hearing the story, his mom, though normally disapproving of such language, had to admit it was an apt description. However, as you'll see at the end, even this perfect storm proved to have a silver lining.

First, a little background: Earlier this year, one of my survey panels invited me to take part in a home product test. The item to be tested was a little device called a Leakbot, which is already in use in Europe and is now being tested for the U.S. market. You clip this gadget onto your home's main water intake pipe, directly above the main shutoff valve, and it can supposedly tell—presumably by detecting changes in water flow through the pipe—when you've got an undetected leak somewhere in your home's plumbing system. It then alerts you through an app and helps you set up an appointment with a plumber.

Anyway, the company offered me a $100 gift card if I would install one of these devices in my home, download the app, and use it for a full year. I figured there was no real downside to this; it wouldn't cost anything, and there was always the chance it might save us some money by catching a leak early on. What did we have to lose?

All went fine for the first month. Then, on a Monday in October, I got a call from Leakbot saying the device had detected a leak in my home. I thought this was odd, since not only had I seen nothing, I hadn't received any alert through the Leakbot app. Just to make sure, I checked the app, and it said our system seemed to be working normally. The phone rep seemed puzzled, but suggested sending out a plumber to check it out just in case. Since I work from home, this was no problem for me, so I agreed to meet with a plumber on Wednesday.

The first thing that went wrong was that the plumber ended up having to reschedule the appointment for Friday—a delay that, for reasons you'll soon see, proved to be significant. So on Friday morning, shortly after Brian (who had taken the day off from work) and I had finished breakfast, two guys showed up on our doorstep and headed down to the utility room to check the system. To do this, the first thing they had to do was shut off the main water valve to the house. And within five minutes, they were back upstairs saying, "We've got some bad news."

The shutoff valve for our plumbing was an old-school compression valve, a type that's particularly likely to break when it gets old—and ours apparently had never been replaced since the house was built in 1971. Knowing this, the plumber did his best to turn it as slowly and gently as possible, but to no avail; it had broken, and the valve was now stuck in the closed position. In short, we no longer had water to the house.

The plumber immediately admitted that, no matter how old and crappy the valve was, fixing it was his responsibility, since he was the last person to touch it. But there was one problem: Since it was the main shutoff valve for the whole house, in order to replace it, he'd need to shut off the water supply to the house at the curb box, which taps into the town water main. And while plumbers normally carry "keys" with them to turn these curb boxes off and on, the curb box used in our town was an unusual type that he didn't have a key for. So we'd have to call the water department to come and shut it off before he could do the repair.

It took a little bit of research to find the number for the water department, and once I managed to get through, they informed me that all their crews were currently out and they'd have to get back to me. I asked if they thought someone would be able to come shut off the water before the office closed at 3pm, since otherwise we'd be without water for the whole weekend, and they could only say, "Well, I hope so." So the plumbers, who had just been sitting around up to this point, decided to take off and attend to another job, while Brian and I had to sit around the house waiting for a call.

Eventually, someone showed up, armed with the appropriate key to turn off the water—but when he tried to put the key into the box, he found he couldn't reach the valve. Due to some sort of settling or shifting, the curb box had actually changed position, leaving the shaft between the shutoff valve and the opening bent and filled with dirt. So there was no way the "key"—basically a long, straight metal pole with a connector on one end—could reach the valve. The guy from the water department informed us we'd have to have the entire box dug out and a new access put in, a job that would probably cost between $2,000 and $3,000—which we'd have to pay out of our own pockets, since the curb box was technically on our property and didn't belong to the borough. So now we were facing a whole weekend without water, plus a repair that would cost between two and three grand. All on account of a leak that, I will stress once again, we had no evidence actually existed.

Well, the plumbers, who had returned from their other job by this point, said their company could take care of the repair for us, but they'd have to send out a separate crew with the right equipment for the job. So we brought up some bottles of water from the basement and settled in for a weekend without running water. Fortunately, the company called us up that evening and said Leakbot had offered to pick up the cost of our new curb box—probably because they realized it would be really bad P.R. if we went around complaining that our Leakbot had cost us $3,000 for repairs because it sent out a plumber to fix a leak that wasn't there. So the good news was, we now knew we weren't on the hook for the expensive repair; the bad news was, we still had no water until it got done. (Leakbot actually offered to pay for the cost of putting us up in a hotel until we could get the curb box replaced, but we declined, figuring we'd be more comfortable at home with no running water than in a hotel with it.)

The repair crew showed up the next day. They didn't bother with any such niceties as ringing the bell or talking to us, so we had only the vaguest idea what was going on out there, but by the afternoon, they'd gone away and left behind a five-by-four-foot patch of gravel where part of our sidewalk had once been. By this, we assumed that we now had a usable curb box. Unfortunately, this got us no closer to having running water in the house, because we still had to wait until Monday for the plumber to come back.

So, first thing Monday morning, I called back the plumbing company to ask when I should expect them. The secretary seemed surprised by the question and said, "You're all done." I had to explain to her that, no, the part of the job that involved heavy digging equipment was done, but we still needed to get the valve replaced before we'd have any water. So she checked the schedules and said, okay,  she'd send someone out on Tuesday. This, in case you're counting, meant a total of four days without water.

Tuesday the plumber showed up. I once again had to call the borough to get them to turn off the water at the curb, which involved making several rounds of back-and-forth calls to them and the plumber to determine that no, they really didn't have the key for the curb box. But eventually we got the water turned off and the plumber installed a new valve. In fact, just for good measure, he installed two—one above the water meter and one below it, which is the setup most homes have. (He explained that most likely, this was the reason our Leakbot had given us a false positive in the first place: the instructions said to clip it to the main water pipe "right above the valve," but in most houses that would mean the valve above the water meter, and I'd installed it below the water meter, since that was the location of the only valve we had. Which means, of course, that if the instructions had simply told me to put it above the water meter, we could have avoided this whole mess.)

Anyway, once the new valve was in place, I had to call the water department yet again to get the water turned back on. The guy from the water department grumbled about the fact that when they'd replaced the box, they hadn't also eliminated the upright piece of pipe that the valve was mounted on, thereby making it unstable. Apparently he'd tried to explain to Brian, the first time he came out, why this was a problem, but between his limited English, Brian's limited plumbing knowledge, and our general frazzled state, it hadn't sunk in, so we didn't think to go out and give the plumbing crew any instructions about it. In any case, it was too late now.

Fortunately, he managed to get the water turned back on without incident, and when I turned on the taps in the house—hallelujah!—water actually came out of them. Admittedly, it came out in a rather spurty fashion due to all the trapped air that had settled in the pipes, but it was a lot better than the barely discernible trickle we'd had before.

When Brian came home, I told him that the problem was now resolved. He went downstairs to take a look at the new valve the plumber had installed, purely out of curiosity, and then came back up saying, "You're not going to like this." Apparently, the new valve—the brand-new valve that we'd gone through all this hassle to get—had a slow leak. It was barely noticeable, just a drop every couple of minutes, but it was definitely there. So after spending the past four days with no water over a leak we didn't actually have, we now had one.

So, the next day, the plumber—who was surely sick of the sight of us by now—came back to install another new valve. This time, just to make absolutely sure there would be no problems, he installed a different type of valve, one he swore couldn't possibly leak. After one more round of calls to the water department to get the water turned off and back on, we finally had a system that was working as it should.

Unfortunately, we also had a torn-up sidewalk that needed to be repaired. It took only a few minutes of research to determine that this wasn't a job we could reasonably do ourselves, so I had to spend much of the next week trying to reach cement companies to get quotes on a repair, and they were all a lot higher than I expected. We eventually ended up paying $350 out of our own pockets to fix the sidewalk...which we'd had to tear up to replace the curb box...which we'd had to replace because of the broken plumbing valve...which broke because a plumber came out to fix a leak that, I will note yet again, didn't exist. (There was also an expense of about $15 to replace the float valve in our upstairs toilet, which had given up the ghost after four days of having buckets of water dumped on top of it every time we needed to flush. But it was old and touchy anyway, so that expense didn't bother me.)

So, even though the problem is now resolved, it sounds like we have a good reason to be ticked off about the whole situation, wouldn't you say? Except, as it turns out, though, there's a coda to this story that shows how the whole disaster was kind of a blessing in disguise.

You see, the weekend after this whole plumbing debacle, Brian was working at the utility sink in our basement, and when he tried to shut it off, he couldn't. There was a slow but persistent drip that stayed no matter how much he tightened the tap.

Well, that's a simple enough problem to fix, right? All you need to do is shut off the water under the sink, take apart the faucet, and replace the washer. Except when Brian checked below the sink, he found there was no shutoff; the hot and cold water lines were both plumbed directly into the wall. This sent him into a panic, because working on it would require him to shut off the water to the whole house, and he was afraid of setting off yet another chain of catastrophes. He was so freaked out that he declared he didn't want to touch the job; I should just hire a plumber.

However, I wasn't prepared to do this without at least looking into the problem first to see how hard it was likely to be to fix it ourselves. A quick search online suggested that, as I'd thought, it was a very simple job; I told Brian I saw no reason I couldn't handle it myself, with no plumbing experience whatsoever, and he certainly should be able to. If he was really that worried about it, I was willing to call a plumber just to set his mind at ease, but only if he really thought it was necessary.

After hearing this, Brian decided he'd be willing to at least give the job a try. He popped by the Home Depot and picked up an assortment of washers and other small parts, figuring that if one of them proved to be the right size, that would save us the trouble of making a hardware run in the middle of the job (and if none of them was, we could always return the set). As it turned out, one of them was a perfect fit, and the whole repair took us probably 15 minutes, from the time we turned off our spanking new main water shutoff valve to the time we turned it back on.

But here's the beautiful irony: If Brian had discovered this leak two weeks earlier and tried to fix it then, we would have been the ones to break the main water shutoff valve. We would still have gone through the entire series of problems with the valve and the curb box and the four days without water, but with one crucial difference: We would have had to pay for the new valve, as well as the new curb box, out of our own pockets, to the tune of around three grand. But as it was, we got both jobs done for free and only needed to pay $350 for the sidewalk repair. So ironically, by giving us a false alarm and setting off a whole chain of unnecessary repairs, Leakbot actually ended up saving us quite a lot of money.

Of course, when the repair crew came to fix the sidewalk, they also pointed out some previously unnoticed, but definitely significant, problems with our roof. So it looks like our home-repair troubles are not over yet. But replacing the roof is an unrelated problem, one that I'll no doubt cover in a future post.