WASA Big Idea? Part 3

Possible subtitle:
On The Rag with the DC Water and Sewer Authority

Get the backstory: Part One here, Part Two here.

In Part 2, it was revealed that we did have lead pipe in the feed from the street to the house: In the photo above is the test-pit WASA dug in the front yard to discover this. So we scheduled with WASA's contractor to replace the offending metal. Awesome. The missus and I took the day off to supervise.

And at precisely 8am, they came: Mercenaries of doom with their implements of destruction, heading down to the basement to do great things.

First of all, I admit... our basement is a work in progress. I've been turning it into a double studio (graphic design and music recording) as well as a groovy lounge area... a true DUDE's room. It reeks of nag champa and good music and books and funky awesome vibes down there. But it's a work in progress. Lots of STUFF still to organize. Papers and boxes and cables and books and all manner of things.

It was quite a task to move all that STUFF away from the street-side wall of the basement to give WASA room to do their work. But I was able to clear out a full one-third of the total floorspace. I gave them much more room than they needed, not to be NICE, mind you: just being paranoid about my STUFF getting covered in dust, getting stepped on, etc.


Good move. The brick-drilling device was insanely loud and raised an unholy cloud of red dust which billowed around, lighter than air. A lot of my sensitive equipment was protected under sheets, so it seemed everything was going to be JUST FINE.

I had carved a path through my pile of STUFF to the Mac at the other end of the basement, so I could keep half an eye on the guys and do some work at the same time. I was even getting used to the ear-splitting noise of the machines.

And then a new sound: Crazed shouting (en español) out the basement window to some other worker. He sounded both panicked and angry. Now, my spanish isn't just rusty, it's completely dissolved. I took 2 years of Spanish in high school but of course, it's long since fallen out of my brain. Today, my Spanish consists of, maybe, the days of the week and, on a good day, I can ask to be directed to a bathroom. Or a beer. Depends on the priorities of the moment.

So I looked towards the shouting just in time to see a giant wave of red soil-water flowing through the hole in the brick wall, covering the floor like a rushing tide, towards my sacred pile of STUFF.

Holy shit, señor.

It would seem that their "mole" (that would be the Porta-Mole, an earth-boring machine) had punctured the bit of pipe behind the closed valve, causing a full-force leak of city water to flood the new hole and thus, the basement. The best comparison would be getting a perforated bowel during a colonoscopy procedure... oopsie!

The water keeps coming. Worker guy runs back to the basement window and shouts more words in hyperspeed Spanish, sounding more panicked, more angry. Eventually the flow stops. Meanwhile, I've grabbed all absorbent items I can find; towels, blankets, etc., and have fashioned a barrier which saturates with the filthy stuff instantly.

Back to the window, more shouting. A pair of hands appears from outside, shoving in a bucket and some rags. Another guy comes in, and all three of us enjoy a silent half hour of bonding over a floor. And a bucket. And a pile of rags.


Luckily, I was able to build my mountain of STUFF without anything valuable on the bottom. So, miraculously, nothing critical was destroyed. From the beginning, I've designed this basement with the expectation that it WILL flood some day. Doesn't every basement eventually have a flood?

If anything had been damaged, I'd certainly be all over the foreman and working out a cut (or total waiver) of the cost of this operation. Anyway; on with the show.


The shiny new pipe was threaded, welded, sealed, whatever, and all workers disappeared in a flurry of motion. The site supervisor came by to inspect the work, and he explained their little mishap. I had never heard of a "mole" in equipment terms. I was half-believing this was the work of an underground rodent creature that could puncture hundred year-old lead pipe with its teeth.

A 'mole' eh? You don't say...

So now, like the shell-shocked combat veteran that gets twitchy when a helicopter flies over, I may FREAK OUT whenever I hear somebody shouting in Spanish. It may be years from now, when this event is long forgotten. I'll pass some dude screaming in Spanish, and I'll suddenly be compelled to grab blankets and rags for no reason...

WASA Big Idea? Part 1

Blogging encourages a certain level of hyper-local reporting. And starting today, Intangible Arts will beat the SNOT out of the idea, drilling the idea of "hyper-local" down to a single block of Irving Street NW, between Georgia Avenue and Warder Street.

The reason is simple: The DC Water and Sewer Authority will be transforming this block into a war-zone for nearly three months, as part of their program to replace lead service pipes. And the photo-ops will be many, since Intangible Arts HQ is right in the middle of it.

WASA appears to be doing this in a block-by-block sweep across certain areas affected by lead pipes. And so I figured: maybe someone in the area is still waiting for this to go down on their block, and might dig hearing about it beforehand. Because we certainly had questions. And still do.

The idea is, simply, to replace any lead pipes up to the boundary of private property. But WASA has provided access to a contractor to handle the homeowner's side of the pipe. Que convenient! We opted for this as well. The full monty. Bring it on.


We were given early notice of this project months ago, with only the vague warning that AT SOME POINT, we'll be given 48 hours' notice before the destruction begins. And that notice arrived last Friday.

A trench will be dug (presumably along the public sidewalk) to reveal the main service pipe, and individual 5'x5' test-pits will be dug at each rowhouse unit to determine what sort of pipe is down there. So say goodbye to those day-lilies, hostas, or that festive ragweed garden you've been tending for years...

There will be blood.

This weekend, the trees along Irving Street were caged in bright orange safety-mesh, and a plague of equally bright orange traffic-cones appeared, ready for action. It seemed amusing, since the city just planted those trees recently. Clearly there's a lack of communication between divisions here.


The tone here may sound cynical, but this is actually a good thing. Theoretically, once the service pipes are all lead-free and consist of the same (or similar) metals, our first blast of tap-water in the morning should NO LONGER smell like Satan's own leftover egg salad. And that will be a joyous day in Intangible Land.

So, stay tuned: This is merely the introduction to what should be a freakin' fascinating series. If you had fun watching the grass grow, watching paint dry, or meditating on TV static, buddy, you ain't SEEN real fun yet. Updates will follow. Oh yes they will.

weeding is fundamental

Holy organic crap, batman, when did this happen?

The 'mingoes in the flowerbed mysteriously know when spring has arrived. Some kind of natural psychic sense...or something equally mysterious.

Behold: SUPERCAN!

About a month and a half ago, our trashcan was stolen. Or liberated. Or set free. Or had it's plastic ass raptured outta here somehow.

It's not unusual. The previous home-owner had done a pretty bad job of painting the house numbers on the can, but the numbers were there. Every few months, the can disappears for a week. I figure a neighbor mistakenly (or deliberately) snatches the wrong one from the alley, after the trash is collected. No big deal. It always comes back.

It always comes back, right?

Not so! After two weeks, we became worried that our tubby green plastic-rubber pal had been spirited away for good.

Not knowing if it would even work, I requested another through the DC Gov't website. That was on 11sept. I was given a projected "resolution date" of 12sept.

Wow, I thought, that's ambitious. Next day. Hmm.

Next day came, with no can delivered. Day after, no can. Admittedly, I don't trust online service-requests like this. Typically you enter data and click the FLUSH INTO OBLIVION button. So, no surprises here. Our neighbor had loaned us one of his extra cans, so we weren't exactly drowning in garbage. But it was looking like we'd have to blow some cash on a new one.

But then a magic cloud of government pixie-dust descended upon the District of Columbia. It was Friday, 19oct, maybe 6pm. Having hopped off the bus at Georgia Avenue, I walked up to the house and was faced with a beautiful thing. Manna from Fenty:


It was a virgin SUPERCAN, untainted by kitchen wastes or hefty-bags. It was beautiful: not yet rained upon, nor dented by cars, nor peed-upon by psychotic squirrels.


The SUPERCAN: DC's newly redesigned household trashcan, with attached lid to keep rats out, and all that trashy goodness in... For one bright moment, my faith in local government had been restored.


It was, and I only exaggerate slightly here, our happiest day ever. Marian and I held hands and giggled in the street as rose-petals fell from the skies... I mean, hell, once in a while the system works. Even if it was a few weeks after that unrealistic "resolution date."

Then a gratuitous photo-shoot of the new can ensued. I can imagine our neighbors watching this, terrified, through closed blinds...what in satan's name is that man doing??!?!

No matter. We shall stencil the living crap outta this can, and we shall embrace the civic majesty of TRASH DAY. Oh yes.

Behold the Death Bag.

After the crushing failure of our last experiment with fly-killing technology, we're trying a new one. THE DEATH BAG. It's FINAL SOLUTION time, brothers and sisters... Oscar the gargoyle will survey the carnage and, as before, I'll probably blog about it incessantly. Probably with bar-charts and line-graphs analyzing the inevitable body-count.

We live in very dangerous times, and much fly-blood will be spilled before a new era can begin. We shall reclaim the back yard from the nasty mob-rule of Lucilia sericata. Stay tuned...

Time to clean the toaster?

Everybody sing now:
Oven you.... is easy 'cause you're beautiful...

We came back from walking the dog and spotted a mouse leaping OUT of the TOASTER. It darted behind the oven and was gone. I assume he's got a special mousey crash pad back there, where the gas feed comes through the wall.

Or maybe this mouse has been hooking up Gomez with whatever speed he's been on, 'cuz brother, he's BACK from the surgery. He's a lightning bolt of weirdness. Bouncing off the walls like a maniac with ten minutes to live. That boxer spirit lives on, even without testicles. But that's beside the point.

We still have this mouse thing.

It would seem we're having a nice little synchronicity with a good friend, whose uninvited house-guests might resemble mice, but come with very fashionable leathery wings... She's tried to evict her guests, but they've recently come back. Or maybe it's just a misguided youngster. Anyway.

Our own little squatter is not nearly as fashionable, and we hope that having a speedfreak puppy in the house provides enough incentive for the little piece of hairy bastard popcorn to stay hidden. Or find someplace else to live.

Or perhaps I should be grateful.

I mean, if it wasn't for our little toaster mouse (I shall name him.....PopTart), I'd have no reason to photograph that space behind the oven.

So there. A silver lining. Thank you, little PopTart....wherever you are.

Exotica con carne

With the promise of mild weather (a freakish concept for DC in July), we succumbed to the lure of the road: To go someplace weird and remote, dig it briefly, and run back to the safety of home.

Our destination was due west. Friends from Arizona were staying at a timeshare in the far hills of Virginia, in a townhouse overlooking the Shenandoah mountains. We looked at the map and discovered we were within an eagle’s pee of the West Virginia border.

The scenery was marvelous, the air was clean and breezy, and the hills were dotted with enough houses to keep us wondering just where the hell do these people WORK!?!?? They can’t all be farmers or retired lobbyists.

We couldn’t stay long; this was just a brief diversion. But it was on our return trip that we spotted another, stranger diversion...

The Wetlands Trading Company reeked of craziness when we zoomed by on the twisted mountain road... Hell’s donkeys! We need to go back there!

The grounds were scattered with various lawn-and-garden oddities like stone angel statues, sun-faces, and water-nymph fountains dribbling water from all manner of orifices. But it was the large tiki-head which spoke to me deeply, on some primal level that should never be let loose upon the earth.

We are, all of us, feral beasts if you dig deep enough.

This tiki must’ve weighed about 130 pounds, made of solid, exterior-grade cement, and sporting a gaping mouth and typically long, insane features. Dammit, that thing needs to be in our front yard. I figured the neighbors would either dig it, or they’d form an angry, torch-wielding mob and run us out of town.

Somehow, we heaved the beast in the back seat and drove it home, not knowing how we’d get it out of the car again.


It’s all a blur at this point, but praise Allah for nice neighbors. We must’ve been quite a sight: two weakling whiteys, wrestling with this ungodly heavy piece of concrete. The tiki was still wrapped in its protective bedsheet when our neighbor heroes dashed across the street and hauled it up for us. I removed the sheet and with some effort, turned the thing around to gape its monstrous teeth at the street. Those poor guys had no idea they were hauling a demon for us.

So now the clock is ticking: I figure if the neighbors go all angry-mob on us, it's got to happen within the next 72 hours. If we make it past that point, we're good.

Oh yes, his name is Denny. Obviously.

Lord of the Flies: Mission is Terminated

For the backstory on this, see this post, and its follow-up.

As of today, 2june07, the bodycount has not improved much. The much-anticipated devastating holocaust has become just an amusing anecdote of failure, adrift in a tiny, irony-soaked blog.....just pixels in the wind, my friends.

We bagged just one more fly since last report, and alas, another gorgeous spider has fallen to my thirst for blood and violence...another innocent non-combatant. As instructed, I faithfully swished, swirled, and agitated the "attractant" liquid mixture, to keep it fresh and appealing to all enemy flies. I agitated and agitated, until my agitator was sore. But alas, it was not enough. And so, having abandoned The Device, the attractant has turned a foul shade of rust, and the few victims mock me from their fetid, fluid grave.

I'm folding up my maps and shuttering the war room. The Mission is Terminated.

Perhaps we'll amass a new arsenal of weaponry, and launch a new offensive. But for the moment, no extended tours at the front. We're bringing the troops home.

Lord of the Flies: Bodycount report no.1

We at IntangibleArts HQ have been bombarded with urgent requests for updates, following our deployment of a certain chemical warfare agent last week. Read the back-story here.

The agent was deployed almost exactly one week ago, at 3:35pm on Sunday, 13may07. I expected a bloodbath. I sat in my comfy chair inside, and craned my neck to hear the gasping despair of the newly doomed...

But no such gasping despair came.

None came, in fact, for nearly four days. I checked on The Weapon at 1:15pm on Thursday 17may07, and discovered only three small casualties, and they didn't even appear to be flies. They appeared to be FLEAS, actually. Three tiny bodies with teardrop wings. But where are the accursed Green Bottle-Flies? THEY are the ones whose blood I intended to spill.

The first bottlefly fell sometime during the later afternoon hours that same day. I estimate 4:30, Thursday 17may07.

Perhaps that was the magic bullet, because two more have fallen since then. BUT, in the intoxicating madness that can only be described as The Fog of War, an innocent non-combatant was terminated. A large black spider was discovered in the muck today, alongside the flies and (possible) fleas. Time of death must have been sometime Sunday morning, 20may07.


If we have anything to learn from America's recent military history, it's that innocent blood will always be spilled when the battleground comes home, and tactics turn from conventional fighting to guerilla warfare. That poor spider didn't need to meet this kind of end.

But we must choke back our tears and tighten our boot-laces, for the war is long from over. We're in it to win it, and there must be thirty five billion bottle-flies out there who will soon, swiftly, meet their maker.

Thus far, the rather disappointing bodycount is as follows:
POSSIBLE FLEAS: 2
BOTTLE FLIES: 3
BIGASS SPIDER (noncombatant): 1

Lord of the Flies

Phaenicia sericata, most commonly known as the Green Bottle-Fly, is actually quite a beautiful specimen, with its metallic green exoskeleton and bright red compound eyes. It is found across the globe, and is fond of all things rancid: dead animals, excrement, rotten food, etc. These materials make superior venues for laying eggs, as they provide warmth and nutrients for the young hatchlings.

In our back yard, they've had a population explosion. And yes, we pick up after the dog, regularly. But phaenicia sericata is a fast little bastard. They've set up shop and are having quite a party back there.

Enter the Captivator (TM) Fly Trap, as manufactured by Farnham Horse Products of Phoenix, AZ. We stumbled upon this product at a local big-box pet retailer (name withheld: they get enough advertising airtime), and decided to give it a try.

Being an obsessive/compulsive type with a flair for morbid humor, I decided to document this in the name of consumer reporting. Thus, on a regular basis, I will provide progress reports and bodycounts of flies terminated. Perhaps this will be useful to someone out there. If the Captivator (TM) does well, perhaps the Farnham company can contact me. For an enormous fee, I will test their other products here.

That's the setup. Now let's get down to some serious fly-killing.

The Captivator consists of a plastic jar with vented screw-top lid, which enables the scented bait to vent outward, and doomed flies to venture inward. The actual contents of the sealed tube of bait is something of a mystery. But yes, it does smell horrific. Mom used to say, medicine MUST taste bad. It means it's working.

To deploy the weapon, one should wear protective rubber gloves. Twist open the tube of Mysterious Bait Substance and squirt its contents into the empty jar. Then, fill the jar halfway with clean water. Agitate the water to dilute the bait evenly. Then, screw the lid tightly and open the vented lid. Place the unit on the ground, or hang from a line to within 4 feet of the ground. We've opted for this hanging method of deployment. See inset photo. Click for enlargement.

The Captivator was deployed at exactly 3:35pm on Sunday, 13may07, suspended 3 feet above the backyard flowerbed by a line of fashionable brown suede...

Note to self: We really must buy some STRING someday. It's quite useful stuff, certainly, but who actually seeks out STRING, deliberately?

So now, we wait. I will document our progress with frightening detail, and with any luck, word will spread among the phaenicia sericata community of Washington DC, that our home is a place of terror...a place of confinement...a place of suffocation and death.

Stay tuned. This could get very interesting.

Backyard Treasures

We found this odd rusted artifact under the ground-cover plants in the back yard and decided it had artful potential. It's interesting that we've been in the house a full year and only now discovered this monstrously huge, bludgeon-worthy item hiding under our feet.

We sit back and make thoughtful, squinty faces, wondering what heroic deeds this odd rusted artifact has done in its lifetime before coming to rest here, in the backyard of a humble rowhouse in Columbia Heights, Washington DC.

Strange rusted hooky things are indeed the stuff of dreams.

And yes, the garage really is painted that color. Came that way. So what.

A pipedream of bitter combat

Sure, it wasn't the Guadalcanal landing, but still...the body-count was quite high.

Top photo: The soldier on the far right fell in the line of duty on Thursday evening. The other three were victims of an insurgent attack of bitter cold on the following night. A "troop surge" was hastily deployed to replace these casualties, despite the clause in our home warranty that doesn't cover burst pipes.

Now, we are left with a good lesson for all those planning to add an extension (with bathroom) behind their existing 93 year-old urban rowhouse: dude, insulate the new walls, please. See smaller photo: That's interior drywall, a freezing void of empty space, and exterior wallboard with siding on the outside. In the middle space is a teeny, vulnerable little pipe feeding the Waters of Life to the toilet tank. Thanks a bunch, previous homeowners. We'll take it from here, with a little help from our new contractor friends.

...suddenly, it's no wonder the pipes are freezing. And we study the Weather Channel's predictions for next week, making sad little pig noises at the television. Clearly, this winter will not go down without a fight. And yes, as a fitting nod to the previous post, delivery Chinese was ordered again. (note to self: kung pao beats the pants off the general tso. The tso really didn't deserve the "spicy" icon in the menu.)

And diggit: we were denied fortune cookies again. If there is a god, it owes us FOUR (4) fortune cookies. Payable ASAP. Thank you.

Zen and the art of freaking out

February 6, 2007 in Washington DC: highs somewhere in the 20s, with wind-chill somewhere in the bleakest pits of Satan's wine-cellar.

Came home to frozen pipes, which immediately justified ordering Chinese. Kung Pao makes a plumbing crisis go down with dignity.....or does it? Washington Gas advises us to crank the furnace, warm up the pipes, and leave all the taps dripping. It all resembles living in Syracuse a bit too much.

The final insult? No fortune cookies in the bag. Damn them all.

Splinters of victory on a concrete floor

Long after removing the filthy carpet, The last of those (evil, nasty, infernal, stubborn) tacking-strips have finally been pulled out of the cement basement floor. Now to patch the holes with ready-mixed concrete, then seal & paint the sucka.

The experience made one thing perfectly clear: We must now add the Superbar XL (manufactured by Vaughan & Bushnell) to the list of Sacred Wonders of Mankind. This list includes such items as duct tape, vice-grips, and WD-40. Without these items, humankind would be reduced to the level of mute centipedes.

But no! Back to the matter at hand! We were celebrating the last of the tacking-strips being ripped out of the concrete. So, a slight pause. With camera to capture the moment... and a beer, perhaps. Where's that flyer for Pizza Boli's...?

sky above, roof below

While we were enjoying the early turn of Autumn in Maine, there were gremlins at work back home...and praise Allah for that.

After many logistical twists & turns, we finally found and booked a decent roofing contractor to take care of certain, uh, weaknesses we discovered during the massive rains last June. You might recall that little adventure of building an improvised midnight bivouac with tarps and boards and misc. household items...

And so, as if by magic, we returned home to a lovely new reflective-surfaced torchdown bitumen roof above the main house, and an impressively impermeable EPDM rubber-surfaced roof over the extension in back. So now, we must find someone to rebuild the deck we (sadly) had to tear down for the smaller roof project. sigh.

The huge up-side of all this is, of course, we need not fear a little rain. Infact, it can rain all it bloody well wants to, now.

Anytime. C'mon...

damage control

I tend to sleep rather soundly.

For me, falling asleep is like the cellular process of petrification; It crawls through the tissues of the body in a deep wave, coating all living cells and leaving cool, gray stones. Dreams are a sinister, internal circus that take inspiration from noises outside the body, which explains why alarm-clock radios never work for me. The radio noise simply becomes the soundtrack to the movies under the eyelids...

Not this time. The sudden shock of thunder cut through all that dreamy stuff like a blunt force trauma.
Boom.
--It was a physical affront to the body, it was IN the face.
Boom.
--That was close.
Boom.
--That was much closer.
BOOM.
--Dear Jesus, I think that one shaved my leg.

I've been a fan of storms and harsh weather for ages, and THIS lightning was definitely top-shelf. Far above average for DC, and too intense to let me sleep. Then the waterfall began. No, wait: that's not the sound of rain. That's inside.

Sleepy stumble down the stairs. Shuffle to the source of the noise. Stare in helpless disbelief at the ceiling of the bathroom. Yes, it's like being behind the falls at Niagara. Uh......

And that's when the fun begins: Facing urgent problems like this, after being soundly asleep for several hours, is enough to reduce even the strongest man to gibbering like a rabid monkey. And there was gibbering that night.

Washington DC had entered its heaviest period of rain since the mid '70s. A frontal system had stalled over the eastern states, keeping a group of powerful storms in place like snarling dogs on a short leash. No end in sight for about five days.

And so, a bivouac-on-the-deck project began; a desperate, improvised attempt to keep the water from hitting the back of the deck against the house, and leaking through to the bathroom below. In our sleepy delirium, we ended up using three tarpaulins, a stretch of duct tape, two large ladders, six roofing nails, three large pieces of scrap wall paneling, a large 2x4, three cinder-blocks, and about nine feet of christmas-lights to tie everything down. Eventually we had built something that looked like the play-fort of some psychotic ten year old survivalist gun-crazed commie-hunter.

When one is too sleepy to reason with tools, and scared to death that the bathroom ceiling will come down any minute, the resulting construction will inevitably be over the top. Thus, we had built a mad blue kite and nailed it to the side of the house. Didn't get much sleep that night.

And as of this writing, it's still bloody raining. The play-fort is holding nicely. The indoor waterfall has stopped. And we consider letting it dry out and fixing it ourselves, or throwing money at the problem like any good American is supposed to do.

Boom.

White Chick

Summer in DC has finally unfurled like a hot, oily dishrag and all the people lie gasping beneath it in a haze of moist despair...

...or is it the sinking realization that NO amount of fascist, paranoid craziness on the part of the Bush regime will be sufficient to gel enough resistance to get that pimple-eyed stooge and his pack of sand-bagging hellhounds out of my city?

nurse! the sedative! for god's sake, get the sedative!

ehh, it's too hot for that level of reality. If there's any justice, they'll all find themselves whimpering like badly neutered dogs before the firing squads of Paradise... Hey, nobody said there wasn't a Judicial Branch in the Great Hereafter. Perhaps they have a "second-death" sentence?

Meanwhile, White Chick stands vigilant at the base of the stairs, waiting for the contractors to arrive. There will be fresh paint and some porch repairs to supervise this week.

Sit. Stay. Guard the house, White Chick...