For the past few weeks, I've had a dripping faucet in my bathroom. This wouldn't be so bad if the sink was draining properly forcing me to either scoop water out of the basin every few hours or have a flooded bathroom. But on the plus side, I never had to run water to wash my hands or brush my teeth (though I still had to scoop out the used water when I was finished).

I'm the only one living in this building so maintanance is pretty much up to me, but since everything I touch breaks (seriously, I'm blacklisted at every glass, ceramic and Christmas shop in the area) I had to call, recall and call again (and again) for repairs. Today, I finally got an answer.

It was about 11:35 when help arrived. An inch and a half of water was already standing in the sink despite scooping it out about an hour prior. As I imagined, it wasn't hard to diagnos the problem:

"You see," he said. "Your washer is worn out - dead actually, and this down here (pointing to the trap) was almost completely disentregrated. I went to loosen it, and it just fell into my hand."

He took the sink apart and left for about an hour. After a few minutes of clanging, he appeared to ask how to configure the faucet knobs ("up-down or straight across"). I told him "across" and he heads back to the bathroom only to re-emerge about a minute later to ask about the "controls." I tell him "up is on," he sighed and went back in (guessed wrong again).

Shortly after 2 O'clock, he was gone and so was the drip (finally).