Around the house

In August we brought in a team to dig up our main house drain.  There had been some backing up from the perimeter tile over the years and I wanted to find the problem.  Mary and her sister Janet had personally installed the perimeter tile 40 years ago and I had personally installed the drains inside and away from the house.  Over the years I have forgotten just how I had done the joinery, but digging everything up soon clarified the situation. 

I had done the design and installation work, but left the backfilling to someone else.  As it turned out we found that they had purposefully dumped large pieces of concrete (old well tile parts) into the backfill and damaged my interior exit right from the beginning.  They were also responsible for dumping a 500 pound rock on the tile further down which I found many years ago.  It's amazing what a few irresponsible people can do in an afternoon. 

Because of their actions, water had backed up in the tile permanently and invited tree roots to further choke off the drain they had blocked. 

This is our thirty-ninth year living in the house.  I'll have to do a major article for year 40.

We had to dig down 7' to find the tiles.