Frozen pipes. They're never any fun, but this cold snap managed to freeze the supply line to the toilet, the hot water line to the bathroom (even though we left a trickle running) as well as the drain lines from the bathroom and the kitchen sink. We had running water in the house, but for several days could not get it out except in buckets.
We've had freezes before but nothing quite like this wherein the seizure was all but complete even though we took precautions. Temps were much lower for a longer period than we'd ever experienced, and the truth is with the drain lines, there's almost nothing we could have done to prevent their freezing given the temperatures (one overnight was 19 or 20 below zero) we were experiencing.
This house wasn't built for that kind of cold, and in fact, it hardly ever happens. Below zero over nights and never above freezing daytimes (sunshine, tho!) for more than a day or so is rare. The plumber who came to help clear out the bathroom blockage said he'd lived in this area all his life and nothing like this kind of cold had happened in his memory. There were busted pipes all over, but not as many as would have happened when most everyone had metal pipes. Now of course it's PEX, and that can freeze without bursting.
Only the kitchen sink drain is still frozen. Hopefully, if the outside temp is warm enough, it will clear today.
And we'll catch our breath for a moment and go on.
Someone stole our St. Francis statue off the front porch during one of the very cold nights. We've had him for quite a while, and he was getting kind of battered. He's plaster and hollow and parts had been breaking off (a large hole had appeared on his left shoulder and pieces were breaking on his back) but he was the Protector of our house and its animals (of which there are many.)
I discovered him missing when I opened the front door to check on the cats. Just a half hour before, I'd gone out to inspect the drain access -- and found the accesses full to the brim with a film of ice on top. It was very cold outside. We heard what sounded like a cat ringing the plastic bell by the door the way they do to let us know they want to come in. It sounds like a soft knock. But we didn't check for at least another fifteen minutes or so. That's when I saw that the five-foot high statue of St Francis with his birds and animals was gone.
It was a shock.
Why would anyone take a deteriorating plaster statue of St. Francis? And who would do a thing like that? Where would he go?
I drove around the neighborhood seeing if there was any sign of him, but no.
In the morning I found that there was a set of footprints in the snow outside leading directly from the street to the porch and back to the street. Then later, I found another set of footprints that had come up the driveway and then to the front porch and then went back down the driveway. A scout perhaps? I don't know.
At any rate, St. Francis -- well, this one -- disappeared/was taken (we have another terra cotta one in a pyracantha hedge near the front porch) soon after Ms Ché bought a Bill Worrell style metal shamanic statue that we have installed by the side door (where my attacker entered last summer) and who seems to be settled in nicely, cold and snow or no.
I suspect there's some kind of symmetry going on. Only so many Protectors at one time maybe, and two St Francises at the front door is a bit lily gilding, no?
So we wait for the unfreezing of the final drain -- hopefully today -- and trust that St. Francis is now protector of the animals somewhere he's needed.
Otherwise, I might begin to lose faith in humanity.
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Update to the update:
The kitchen sink drain did unfreeze late yesterday after I wrote the piece above; we found, however, that the laundry-room drain is still frozen. Tried a load of laundry and found out; luckily I was close to the washer when it started draining mostly onto the floor and was able to turn the washer off before too much water flowed where it shouldn't. Called the plumber back, but I think we'll just have to wait for warmer weather. Meanwhile, I'll get to work on emptying the washer by hand. Oh m'back!
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Twenty buckets later the washer is empty, the clothes and such that were in it are rinsed and dried, the water on the floor is mopped up, but the laundry room drain remains stubbornly frozen. Daytime temps in the low-mid 50s, overnights in the low 20s should unfreeze it soon, but it hasn't happened yet.
The plumber wondered how the drains and supply lines were arranged. In the walls? Nope. Under the house. Hanging free? Yeah, pretty much. Insulated? No. Welp, that's why they freeze. But I pointed out that they only do it when low temps -- ie: single digit or below zero -- persist for a long time, and daytimes are never above freezing. Yap. That's the way it goes. He told the story of growing up one town over, where winter temps are at least as cold as they are here and there is much more snow (usually). He said the pipes at his place would freeze every winter, sometimes for a long time, and that finally his father crawled under the house and insulated the pipes with pool noodles. It was quite a task he said. But it worked. Could I do that here? I said I didn't think so. The floors are actually less than a foot above the ground, so there's no real crawl space. The drains that freeze shouldn't but they do because part of them are exposed under the house before they converge on the main line under ground. When it is cold enough, it's almost impossible to keep them from freezing. He said try running more hot water than just a trickle during cold snaps, enough to make steam in the drain lines, as that could help keep them open.
The laundry room drain, though, is a problem. We had that one put in some years ago. It looked like there was a drain there when we moved in, but we found on first use it was blocked, and when we had a plumber look at it, we discovered it didn't go to the main drain but simply dropped water into a pit under the laundry room. Oh fine.
So we had a proper drain for the washer installed. It meant digging to make all the connections, and lo and behold, the plumbers made a discovery. It wasn't really a pit that the bogus washer drain drained into, it was a semi-basement with a dirt floor and a staircase under what's now a bank of pantry cabinets. Oh. Maybe it was a root cellar. Or even a storm cellar. Who knows. But that's what the laundry room and a portion of the kitchen were built over, and that was where the laundry room drain drained into.
The drain line we had installed in the laundry room is partially attached to the floor joists and is exposed to the ambient temperature which is essentially whatever the temperature is outside. So. It freezes like now. This is the first time, though.
So far no burst pipes, so at least there's that.
I'm contemplating a grand renovation program... 😃
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For the record, the laundry room drain unfroze yesterday 2/10. Daytime temperatures were in the high 50s, overnight about 30. That did the trick.
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