There is some poor son of a bitch out front randomly digging up our yard in search of the leaky pipe. Which, fortunately, turned out to be freshwater rather than the effluviescent* alternative, but the fortune pretty much stops there.
I suspect this guy is just some dude hired as day labor, and I'm also willing to bet whoever eventually replaces the pipes will know as much about plumbing as I do about about jet maintenance.
The first guy the landlady sent out couldn't do it because the water and muck on the front steps have attracted bees, and he's deathly allergic to bees, so one sting--just one sting!--and we'd have to drive him to the hospital. He practically ran away from our house and the bees, poor guy. The new guy who came out yesterday kept asking Eric where the leak was until Eric snapped that he had no idea, seeing how he was not a plumber and all. It's too bad Eric's not a plumber, really, because that makes probably zero plumbers involved in this circus. The world could probably use more plumbers in general. They're just nice to have around, I think.
I guess I should be grateful that anyone's doing anything at all. This recent activity comes after two months of the landlady trying, in her stupid-savvy way, to insist that there was no leak, or if there was one, then there was nothing she could do about it, despite reports from the city, heartbreakingly enormous water bills, and overwhelming physical evidence to the contrary.
She has many tactics, this woman. She changes the subject, confuses the issue, lies to our faces. When finally cornered, she drags a bunch of ill-equipped people out to do the best they can.
This woman reminds us of someone, but we can't quite put our fingers on it. We think she is a bad person. We wish she would be devoured by rabid javelinas.
*New word, do you like it?