Bad Old Days

Cleaning out some old notes on my computer, I came across a bill incurred the night before we moved out of our Minneapolis house, two and a half years ago.

That night, the new owners suddenly decided that, actually, they wouldn't close on the house unless we did fix that "leaky" pipe under the bathroom sink. (This, after they had earlier said that - since both our and their inspector thought it was no biggie, it was something they'd handle later.) Fact was, the pipe was just old, not corroded.

But after they dropped this bomb around dinnertime, our realtor called her favorite plumber, and he came down at 7 pm to check the pipe and "fix" it. This entailed not only tearing our vanity away from the wall, but creating a massive mess of water, wet plaster, inside-the-wall filth, and general dirt. He got it all cleaned up, though, and then handed me the bill, which I passed on to my realtor and she passed on to the buyers' realtor. Here's a verbatim chunk of that invoice:

emergency service: $200.00
  "check for leak under bathroom sink (no leak found on drain pipe)

replace 1/2" shut-off valve: $259.00
  repair drip from Moen single handle faucet (install new cartridge): $129.00

total: $588.00

Not bad for 30 minutes of work.

Forecast: Significant blowing and drifting, with the possibility of heavy accumulation in rural areas.