David Gillon

I wasn't having a good day to start with, I've had back-ache for about 24 hours now and I really don't want to be on my feet. (And worse, it may be self-inflicted, I noticed the other day I had two* Butec patches on my arms, meaning I forgot to take the old one off when I put the new one on, and I think I may have pulled the wrong one off. I was certainly feeling crappy enough yesterday I could have been going through withdrawal).

So I was lying on my bed  about 10AM feeling fairly crap and I thought I heard water running, but a check of the bathroom showed no problems. Then I went downstairs to get some painkillers, and again though I heard water, but decided that was the fridge gurgling - which it does noisily from time to time.

I'd barely gotten lain down again when there was a sharp crack, which it took me several minutes to realise was the circuit breaker tripping on the upstairs sockets. This is not a good sign.

This time as soon as I stepped into the bathroom I realised the rug was soaking, pull that up and half the floor is swimming. So I throw down towels and wipe it up. Then I set about looking for where the water is coming from. It's not the pipes into the sink, then I check the water supply into the toilet, which comes in from below, so it's all by feel. And that's wet. Crap.

Then I lift my hand a little higher to check if it's coming in from the isolation valve or the cistern, and WTF!!!

The outside compression seal where the pipe goes into the cistern - those things that look like a wide plastic washer combined with a nut - is spinning free, it's not even remotely tight. Either it's mysteriously worked its way free, or the plumber who converted the cistern to modern innards a couple of years ago completely forgot to tighten it (but if so why has it taken 'til now?). Fortunately tightening a nut is about the one thing plumbing wise I'm technically competent to fix.

So it's tightened as far as I can get it, and there's a pan underneath it, and fingers crossed that's enough - it's now the better part of eight hours later and there;s not a drop of water in the pan, so I think I've got it.

But by god that was the last thing I needed on a day when I can barely stand.