The Plumbing Nightmare

A while back, I said I would recount our adventures in plumbing. I have waited so long because it is a truly painful memory. Even now, I have trouble telling the story without feeling my blood pressure rise. don't get me wrong, I know there are some honest, hard-working, knowledgeable plumbers out there. Those weren't the plumbers we hired. The problem began as a leaky bathtub faucet. Sounds simple enough, right? Wrong. We had to replace the cartridge (whatever that is) which can be a very easy job or a very difficult job. Ours fell into the latter category, which Michael deduced after assessing the situation and researching plumbing fixes on the internet. Believing it beyond his skill to repair, we hired a plumber. Looking back, I could have lived with that leaky faucet for a long time. But there was a drought see, and we didn't want to waste the water. Probably we should have just put a bucket under the faucet and used it to water the plants, but we were well intentioned. No good deed goes unpunished, right?
We have learned a lot from this experience. Primarily what we learned is that all plumbers should be women. Here are my reasons why:
Because a woman would not show up at your house, take a look at the problem, which you already described in detail over the phone, and say she has to go out for a part. No, a woman would have that part with her, most likely in her purse.
A woman would not crawl around under the house and think nothing of coming in and tracking the mud and muck through your entire house. No, a woman would carry a roll of plastic or newspapers just for that purpose.
A woman would not leave the job unfinished only to return not once, but twice-- that's three total visits-- because women know that evenings are important and busy family times.
And a woman, I think, would feel at least some shame in charging you $330 for the pleasure of inconveniencing you beyond all comprehension.
I don't know what they're teaching in plumber school, but I know it isn't best business practices, manners, timeliness, or efficiency. The next time we have a leak, we'll just sell the house.