Δαφνη Ευτυχια Αρθουρος

While trying to decide which plumber to call and wondering when my neighbours would get home so I could ask whether the problem originated in their basement, I decided to procrastiobserve and gather additional clues so I'd know what to tell the plumber when I called. And I noticed that the water was ever so slowly receeding. Since it wasn't getting worse, I thought maybe I could wait until this morning. I did try washing a whole lot of soap down the kitchen sink to see whether suds appeared in the basement. None did.

This morning there's still a lake around the toilet in the basement and a puddle near the washer, but everything else is merely damp, a darker grey on the concrete instead of standing water. So I got braver, and flushed the upstairs toilet a few times and ran more water in the kitchen sink. The pool around the toilet has not grown as a result of these actions, and sprinkling dust on the surface shows no motion (it was slowly flowing west-to-east last night). So I'm thinking that the "pipe burst next door" guess is most likely at this point. I'm enough of a worrywart to still be nervous. Not sure how much to trust the house ... or really, not sure how much to trust my own observations and reasoning. (Are there Great Plumbing Mysteries pertaining to this that I know not of? Am I simply overlooking something that anyone who knows water flows downhill could interpret if only I noticed it in the first place?) But I'm thinking I might go ahead and risk a shower and see what that does. After I de-yuck the bathtub.

Wish me luck.

De-yucking the basement floor (making that lake around the toilet go away is going to be a pain) and unstacking boxes to find out how bad the news is for the ones on the bottom ... those will have to wait until I'm actually feeling kindasorta energetic. Oh, and I'll have to post something nice about my house later, so that I'm not only talking about the problems. (Hey, have I mentioned how much I like those high ceilings on the first floor?)