Brother, Plumber and a sprinkler

I woke up this morning with the kitties nibbling on my arms (gee, I only sleep an extra half hour) and the sound of water hitting the mail box post.  I ran to the window with 2 howling kitties following my footsteps only to be horrified to see the sprinkler system was still on in the front!

First and foremost, the kitties were fed and Sam got his insulin shot.  Then I dashed outside where there is a river running down the street and it starts in my yard. Yikes!  I dashed through the house to the garage and turned off the sprinkler controller.  And removed the battery.  Alas, that did not work (yes, I dashed to the front again).  It's 6:20 am and I check Lowe's and Home Depot but they don't open until 8am on Sundays.

So I took a deep breath and called my brother.  He didn't answer his cell phone.  He always claims he gets up at 5:30 every morning ... every single day. So is he ignoring me?   So I call the house phone, and he's sound asleep.  Oh well, he has the tool to open the city water meter so I go over to get it.  He's still groggy and claiming 'I don't know why I was asleep!'  Ha! Caught him!!!  He was so sleepy he didn't notice I was in my pj's and soaking wet.

Why is it the front yard sprinklers do this?  This is the 2nd time - dang, the city encourages neighbors to tattle and the fine is not a small fine for watering when you aren't supposed to.  And the city emergency water contact puts sprinkler systems at the bottom of their list - last time it took them over 3 hours to come out (that was about 7-8 years ago).

I park in front of the house and jump out of the car only to be even more horrified as my iPhone falls out of my pocket and into the river by the curb.  EKKKK.  It's only 2 months old.  I grab it and then drag the tools out and get the meter lid off.  It's full of water and I put my hand in there (praying that there aren't any moving critters) and I can't find the cut-off valve.  The city added the new electronic meters and it's covering the valve.  So I try the sprinkler meter next.  I can't see anything.  At all.

So now I wake up my sister-in-law.  My brother is out roaming his 2 acres so she says he'll come over.  So I wait some more and watch the water roll down the street.  And now I worry about the tree getting too much water and a wind coming along and it falls (like it's doing in the east).   A friend sees my FB cries for help (hey, I was waiting at the time) and calls, only I can't hear anything so I'm thinking my iPhone is dead and what else can go wrong - the plumber was here yesterday to repair the guest bathroom tub leak.

So Alan appears, and we try to turn off the water but no luck.  So next we try the sprinkler valve.  We're using cups to get the water out and I'm trying to use the top to keep the water off Alan (why I'm not sure because he was soaked by then too).  He finally gets the water turned off and that means I have water in the house!!!!  

So off he goes (to take a nap I bet) and I go dripping into the house.  And the kitties are just watching and staring and I'm sure I heard a snicker or two.  And I'm still in my pj's.

My friend calls again but I can't hear her.  She calls back on the land line and says she could hear me.  She suggests putting the iPhone in rice to dry it out.  Wow - I even have rice so in a bowl of rice it goes.  I mean, well, at this point, it can't hurt it.   So about a half-hour later, I try it and it works fine.  Gee, sometimes, it is nice to have a friend even if she's a Yankee with a Texas twang slowly working it's way into her speech.

I forgot to mention, yesterday the plumber was her to fix the leak in the tub in the guest bathroom.  It had been leaking for a week.  I was collecting water and taking it outside to water the pots.

I hope the rest of the day is boring.