I Am Woman

...and I'm learning how to fix toilets.

Now, before you start laughing let me explain.  I bought a 30 year old townhouse back in June of 2015.  Since moving in I've learned that not much has been replaced in this place.  Oh there's a new refrigerator and a new stove.  There's some fake wood linoleum in the kitchen and slightly new carpeting (I really wanted hardwood floors but I digress...).  But inside this home that's it.  The bathrooms are straight out of the 80's and that is when they were built!

I bought it knowing that it was going to be up to me to do things with it, to fix it up.  I want to redo the bathrooms and the kitchen.  I want to install hardwood floors.  I want cool paint jobs in all the rooms (the dining area just really needs touch ups because it's awesome!)

So eventually, I will get new toilets.  In the meantime however, I'm learning how to fix bits and pieces of these old ones.  The first part that got replaced was the flapper.  Now since I've moved in, the toilets always "made noise" all by themselves.  I had no idea what the problem was and just dealt with it. I figured if someone ever came over here with some toilet knowledge and heard it, well, I could ask them about it.  And finally, someone did!  My family spent Christmas here and I gave the master bedroom to my mother and my stepdad.  Guess they heard the noise and soon, we were headed to Home Depot.  He showed me what was needed, we bought it and headed home.

He did the first toilet and I did the second toilet.  I was so happy with myself that I had finally learned how to do something.  It was quite an exciting moment to fix the flapper on the toilet.  And do you know, since that day, the toilets have not made any noise?

But this week, the toilet handle broke.  I couldn't flush the toilet on the outside.  I had to take the lid off and pull that stick thing (handle arm according to the diagram I am looking at right now).  Today, I headed to Ace Hardware (I try to shop "small") and bought a new handle and handle arm.  According to the package directions this is supposed to be an easy fix.  Sure it is, if the last handle/handle arm condo hasn't fused together.  Believe me, I almost started crying because I could not unscrew the plastic nut from the old contraption.  And my wrench just kept stripping the plastic off.  I hated this house.  I hated this place.  Why didn't I just move out to Garner and buy a brand new place with blah, blah, blah?  Yes, this is what is going through my head.  I saw my dog Roscoe sitting there watching me and knew that I had no choice.  I had to do this.   Finally, I found a straight edge screw driver and slipped it between the nut and the tank.  I pushed and pulled and finally, got that nut off!  Not by unscrewing it.  Lots of broken plastic pieces that I had to clean out of the tank (UGH!!!)
\
Anyway, I did it.  Got the old one off and the new one on.  Flushed it quite a few times to make sure it worked.  It's all good.  Whew!

Oh, and myself and another female put together a treadmill all by ourselves on Thursday!  And it works!  We only missed one step but thankfully it's a cosmetic one.  We celebrated with pizza!  LOL.
It sucks to be alone but I'm learning that I can do things by myself and I don't always have to call on someone to help me.

I am woman...starting to roar.