so After God knows how long, the house plumbing is finally 100%. I believe in miracles, now, sort-of. It's wonderful. It's a blessing. It was expensive,b ut that's what you get when your mother throws caustic soda down the drain and the main pipe further out from where we dug The Trench buckles and clamps itself shut, even though you've told her not to throw the caustic soda down the pipe in the first place... ironically, the sewer-cam guys managed, somehow, to not notice that the 11cm pipe had de-dilated to about 2cm and had a piece of plastic wedged in it, de-dilating it even further, and still are demanding 400 bucks for their trouble. The fact that the report they gave us - basically saying no blockage, the problem is probably the venting system causing a vacuum which is interfering with drainage, but a two way valve into the main inlet - would have actually done sweet F.A. (and they wanted a further 800 bucks to install said two-way valve, quoting 2 hours' work + VAT + parts; the part in question costing a mere R23.99 from the local hardware store) doesn't seem to concern them one little bit. Needless to say, I kept the buckled pipe and took pictures of the cloggage with the little digital camera my sister bought abnd we have invited them over to the house to discuss payment and view the evidence. We will see what happens. Got all hardcore this morning and headed gym-wards at 0700 for a swim. The pool temperature - a tepid 28 centigrade, like 84 in crappy fahrenheit, according to the board. Well, according to my own body thermometer, I make it maybe 14 at a push. Fuck me backwards with a broomstick did I get a cold shock when I jumped in! Packed it in after a mere 600 meters on account of freezing my 'nads off. Okay, so, a pigeon just flew into the office, saw me, panicked, flew out again, missed the window, dinged it's head, flew around again, landed on Tetsuo (one of Justin's "silver bullets" - longish, dull, story), panicked, flew back into the window repeatedly, and then finally realised that the window was about 6 inches to its left, figured it out and pissed off. This all happened like 30 seconds ago - scared the bejesus out of me as it flew in, I tell you. On that note, I need to go and ask someone to re-start my heart-beat. -d-