I'm Back and it's Complicated.....

My last entry was December 23, 2013. It's a brand new year.

So much has happened I don't know where to begin.

Wanda and I bought a new dishwasher. This is in no way more important than any of our other adventures or family visits but so very typical of what happens in our lives.

We like to deal with Home Depot. It has good prices, quality items, free delivery and haul away. We have used its installation service for several items as well. The service people have been on time, polite and the work has been good. 

We made the decision to buy the appliance last Thursday. After looking on-line and finding a good fit we went into the store to order the dishwasher.

"Are you set-up with your air gap?" The salesperson asked.
"What's an air gap?"
"It's complicated. I'll get someone from plumbing to explain it. They won't install the dishwasher if you don't have an air gap."
"OK, but they better talk slow."

I'm ashamed to admit that after talking with a plumber, an electrician and the guy that stocks the men's room I still wasn't sure what an air gap was. But after hours of research I now know.

This is a dishwasher air gap

Why you need an air gap:

If you have a clog in the drain it spits out water to alert you. Running a garbage disposal with a clog in the line can cause dirty water to back up into the dishwasher or even the sink. As the guy from my local building department said, "Say you're cleaning fish in the sink and dirty water backs up all over it. That could contaminate your dinner."

Like that's any different than the fish we get out of waters around here.

Our old dishwasher was installed in 1993 by Mike the Handy Man, so was the fence and it fell down twelve years ago. The dishwasher doesn't owe us anything. It's worked twenty years without an air gap. It's never had an issue with clogs, or kinks, or water back-ups of any kind.

Installing an air gap is easy, if you have a hole for it.

Last spring we replaced the kitchen faucet. Wanda wanted a sprayer attachment. I told her to get whatever she wanted as long as I didn't have to install it. We bought it at Home Depot and they did the install.

See the sprayer on the right? That is where the air gap would go. For twenty-four-years that hole had a cap on it. Now that we need it it's occupied.

The solution was simple enough I thought. Remove the sprayer and voila, a hole appears. 

Not so fast said the plumber. "What type of a fitting does it have?"  
"Fitting?"
"Yes, how is the sprayer attached?"

Since we bought the faucet at Home Depot he found the model and checked it out. We can't remove the sprayer because it's connected with a 'compression' type fitting. There is no way to cap it off and dripping water under the sink (even if into a large bucket) is not an option.

Another suggestion was drilling a hole in the counter top for the air gap thing. There is no place to do that.

At this point I was very frustrated. Wanda and I don't have much company. The only time a dishwasher is really handy is when she bakes. 

"OK, the Hell with it. We'll remove the old dishwasher and live without one until we solve this issue. 

But, we can't do that either.

A drain hose is attached from the old dishwasher to the garbage disposal. So I asked for a fitting or cap to put on the garbage disposal when I remove the hose.

"You can't do that."

Apparently the garbage disposal has what's called a 'knock out' and once 'knocked out' you can not plug up the hole.

So here are our options:

We buy a new faucet without a sprayer. The cost with installation will be around $250. We buy a new garbage disposal and lose the dishwasher. Or we install the new dishwasher ourselves. There are ways of bypassing the air gap device. After all these years of not having one I'm not very concerned about spoiled fish.

My big worry is once I take the old one out (the easy part) can I get the new one in. When I do the install Wanda and Older Daughter Jennifer should plan a spa day. I swear a lot when I do things like this and I'm really not looking forward to it.

Maybe one of you will read this and understand all this compression fittings, knock outs and air gap talk. Maybe you'll even be able to help. I've got a nice crisp hundred in my wallet and it could be yours.

One item on our Christmas-New Years To-Do List was passport renewals. 

Passports are issued for ten years. Travel requires them to be valid for at least six months beyond the completion of a trip. Our current passports expire this September. We got our first passports at the US Post Office. I checked on line; Passports Monday through Friday 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. So off to the local post office we went.

We went on Monday the 23rd. By this date procrastinators must know they're screwed and gifts won't be delivered for Christmas. There was a very short line. Once at the window we said we need to renew our passports. 

The postal clerk handed us (well he didn't really hand us because our post office has bullet and germ proof glass separating us from them) the forms. Wanda asked for a couple of pens and we scurried over to a table and filled them out. We assumed, like our first passports the next step was the photo area so we went over there and knocked on the door. After waiting for a while a clerk told us we need to "mail in the forms."

Why didn't the worker that gave us the forms AND THE PENS tell us that?

Knowing we would need pictures we went to Walgreen's Drug Store. I asked the clerk if they took passport photos, was informed they do and asked how much. She said they were $13.01

"Each?" I asked
"No for two"

She took a picture of me and a picture of Wanda. Ten minutes later we had a nice little package with our nice new passport pictures. The bill was just over $28. I assumed the cost was $13.01 for BOTH OF US, that's why I asked. The charge was for TWO PICTURES. 

What in the Hell am I going to do with a second terrible picture? And to make matters worse I put it next to the one taken ten years ago. I hope I do a lot of traveling in the next ten years. The way I look this may be my last passport.

The cost of each passport is $110. They're mailed to the U.S. State Department through the U.S. Postal Service.

And they suggest I spend an extra $6 to insure and track the package. So if they lose it I can help them find the damn thing. 

Our government at work.