CherkyB - A Profile in Courage

It is with heavy heart I deliver this message to my loyal readers.

I am now close to death. What started out as me thinking I had a bit of a cold has now ended up to be something far more serious, and the normally cheerful an irreverent CherkyB that you all know and love is gone. Perhaps forever.

Before you shed too many tears, know that I have lived a pretty good life, all things considered, and the suffering I now go through will not outweigh all the good times.

I never expected it to happen to me. But, today my cold was so bad that I had to stay home from work. At first, I tried to keep up appearances: logging in to work, phoning in to a 9am meeting, reading and responding to emails, even fielding some work-related IMs and a cell phone call. But now, I realize my precious strength is gone. I am reduced to lying in bed where I have just suffered through "My Name is Earl" and "Kath & Kim." Dear God, I can feel my soul escaping.

My only hope, the last shred of hope that I cling to to keep me going, is that "The Office" and "30 Rock" prove to be somewhat restorative. On "The Office" they are having a debate as to whether Hillary Swank is hot or not. I had to google her as, after meeting The Mrs., I have no eye for any other women.

On a lighter note, when I crawled downstairs from my bedroom prison for lunch, The Mrs. had really great news.

"I hate to tell you this, but the dishwasher appears to be leaking."

Grate.

I checked the door seal, and it looked just fine. So I started it up and sent MaxieC for a Philips screwdriver. Upon MaxieC's return, I removed the toe-plate and took a gander underneath. And Lo! Water poured forth from a spot on the bottom of the tub from whence water should not be pouring forth.

I found this odd, as it was not a broken/loose connection or ruptured hose. It appeared to actually be some rupture in an otherwise nondescript spot on the bottom of the tub. So I had the dishwasher pump itself out, and I peeked inside.

Right in the spot above the leak, there was an odd clump of scorched something right next to a deep divot that appeared to breach the outside of the tub. Something had clearly fallen on the heating coil, heated itself up quite a bit, then fallen off and burned through the tub.

This is why you should always get a dishwasher wait a stainless steel tub, not a crappy plastic-tubbed model. But, like the oven that died last year, it was installed in the house when we bought it, and you don't replace things that are working just fine simply because there might be a better model available. Unless, of course, you're the government.

The Mrs., always cheerful with my money, chimed in, "OK, I guess we should go out and get a new dishwasher today."

Me, CherkyB: "But I'm home sick today."

The Mrs.: "You don't look that bad."

Me, CherkyB: "I took some Dayquil, and it's helping."

The Mrs.: "Well, I guess I could wash dishes by hand until we can replace it."

Me, CherkyB: "[stifling a chortle] I think I can fix this with epoxy clay."

Epoxy clay is what you laypeople know as Miracle Putty from the wonderful Billy Mays infomercials. I use QuikSteel brand because, after trying a few different brands, I found that I have the most success with this one. The local Ace stocks about 5 brands, and they're all within pennies of each other in cost, so it's not obvious which is best if you're just standing there.

I got a bit of QuikSteel, slapped it on the hole, and then ate lunch. Afterwards, I started up the dishwasher, and the leak was gone! It was like a Miracle! I also checked all the local Lowe's, and the earliest I can get the dishwasher I want is Feb 8, so it's a good thing I got this working, because I don't know if we have enough towels to cover up the big pile of dirty dishes that would accumulate if The Mrs. "washed dishes by hand" for two weeks.

And we have a lot of towels.