Plumbing is kind of like oxygen — you take it for granted until you have none. I’ve learned this after the last couple weeks of battling barfing sinks and exploding washing machines. However, I’m happy to announce that, FINALLY, our plumbing woes seem to be gone. Or, maybe not gone all the way, but at least in the realm of acceptable.
The thank you note I wrote the other day to Bob, the gurgling toilet fixer, was a tad immature. In fact, Bob, although a great guy, was a bit out of his league when it came to our drainage woes. Long story short, we had the 100 Acre Woods growing in our 100-year-old terra cotta sewer piping and it finally dawned on us to haul out the big guns of plumbing: Roto-Rooter. Of course, this was only after we sold our soul to Bob’s plumbing company and offered him our second born child for payment of the enormous bill he presented us with, but no sense in crying over spilt milk…or in this case, an overflowing toilet.
So while I wish I had something more exciting to be thankful for, my newly Roto-Rooted pipes actually make me extremely happy. As I write this I’ve done eight loads of laundry in a row and I’m considering pulling an all-nighter just to get rid of this back-log from when we were on a water ration. And while it truly seems pretty mundane, I must admit, I feel like a little kid on Christmas morning. So here’s to plumbers and the people of the world that do jobs I’d never want to do (that includes you, garbage men, proctologists, hotel maids, and pre-school teachers.) THANK YOU!
I like Mike Rowe, host of “Dirty Jobs,” for many reasons. Here are just a few.
A) He is from Baltimore, which is just around the bend from where I dwell in Washington.
B) He has an awesome speaking voice. This is probably because he is a classically trained singer and was an OPERA singer with the Baltimore Opera. Yes, opera. Like he probably wore a velvet tunic once.
C) He was an Eagle Scout.
D) He sold fantastically kitsch merchandise on QVC and got the job while dressed as a viking.
As I type this, I am watching Mike help floss a lama, sort dirty cloth diapers, make fireworks, chase chickens in Miami and stack bricks. And he does it all in a fetching barn jacket. I find it very awesome that this man who helps fight for blue collar workers on and off the set, in said fetching barn jacket, once trilled Mozart on a grand stage. What a renaissance man Mike is.
While things are nice and calm at work right now, sometimes I have serious job envy for any occupation where your brain is not mush by the end of the day and you don’t have to take work home with you. Once I drove past a road crew during a particularly rough deadline and I had an overwhelming feeling of envy. The men got to work outdoors and didn’t have to take the potholes home with them at night.
Yes, I know that’s a ridiculous job to envy because I forget that they have to work in the rain and probably through the night, but at that exact moment, I just wanted to blow up my computer and do a job that required a little elbow greece and help keep America ticking.
That’s what the folks who Mike visits on “Dirty Jobs,” do. They are the backbone of our nation – the ones who make our country beautiful, put food on the table, give us things to buy, an economy that’s not in complete shambles, and a clean and safe society. And it makes damn good television too.
Mike Rowe getting down and dirty for America's real deal jobs. I feel like such a pansy being a journalist sometimes. I should really buck up and spend my day shooting elk or building wells.
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