Basement down the drain

First of all, thank you all so much for the Steven and Chris love and support - talk about amazing! I was really quite touched by how many of you reached out with congratulations, and I am so grateful to have so many friends out there.  MOOAH to all of you!

One of the things I heard the most about was the basement - since I had never properly blogged about it or shown it off.  I was all set to do a post about it today and tell you the tale of how we got it looking so sweet after starting with this narsty, asbestos-filled, unfinished basement:

Blurry blackberry(!) shots taken at the open house

It was a lot of work and a lot of fun, as you can imagine, and we certainly did not do it ourselves.  In the end, we expanded our liveable area by 1/3 and created a really cozy spot where I spent a LOT of my second maternity leave.

Last night I was down in my newly improved "office" area doing some actual paid work (amazing) and heard some weird gurgling coming from the shower area in the bathroom.  People - when the drains gurgle, sputter, cough, or make so much as a peep - please call a plumber.

Because I am a kind and decent person, I will spare you the more graphic images of what I came down to this morning (and immediately texted my poor husband), and show you only this one.  The shower is one of three drains we have down there, the other two under the dryer and in the furnace closet.  Grossness was spewing from all three.  (Sorry, not often I get to use the word spewing and it is such a perfectly disgusting word, don't you think?)  So, a bit belatedly, I called the plumber (apparently the plumber Mike Holmes uses!).  Bob The Plumber* did not mince words, and, sadly, neither did he use the word spewing.

Blog buddies, I trust you remember this scene, in which we were attacked by our neighbour's tree, narrowly escaping the loss of one son, and burdened with expenses for removal and repairs?

It turns out this was just the first chapter in our "Nasty Dealings with Neighbouring Trees" - which hopefully ends after two (expensive) chapters.  This time, having been perhaps inspired by its ally Neighbouring-Tree-To-The-West's surprise air attack, the Neighbouring-Tree-To-The-North deviously tunneled underground with its roots, harpooning our defenceless clay pipes, and strategically blocking our sewage outflow.  Well played Neighbour's Trees, well played.**

My beautiful basement now looks like this.  Please note how much bigger the water stain is on the concrete than it appeared on the rug!  Luckily Bob the Plumber had me call Chad the Clean-Up-Guy*** and my basement has been cleaned, bleached, and disinfected by a fine crew who just left at 8pm.  The heaters and fans are running as I type, and the place smells like the YMCA.  Next up, digging up our recently-landscaped-with-patio-stone front walkway and the possible removal of our concrete front steps to replace our outtake pipe.

The moral of this story is, never show your house on National television - hubris is a bitch.

*not to be confused with Bob the Builder
**duh, of COURSE I am drinking wine - wouldn't you??
***not of the Pulp Fiction variety