The weekend that was really a challange

This last weekend I visited my daughter in Maryland. This is usually a nice time but this last weekend was the weekend from H***. My daughter lives in an old farmhouse (80 Years old or older) and now don't get me wrong. It is a beautiful house and has a lot of nice qualities about it. But when something goes wrong it is a real hassle to fix. This last week the upstairs bathroom sink would not drain. Little did I realized what would be involved in trying to fix this problem. After I took the drain from the sink the pipe was so corroded that it fell apart in my hands. I knew at this time I was in for a real time fixing the problem. The first thing that had to be done is the ceiling in the room below the bathroom had to be taken out to expose the old pipes. After gaining access to the old pipes I discovered that they were Galvanized pipe and had to be taken apart. This normally would not have been a problem except for the age of the pipes and the fact that they were rusted together. As it turned out I had to cut the pipe out to replace it. However getting to the pipe was such an ordeal that I had to go buy the tools to cut the pipe out. After cutting the pipe out I discovered this old 1 1/2 pipe only had an opening of about 1/4 inch for the water to drain through. There was that much corrosion in the pipe. I had to cut back almost to the main drainage pipe. Then I ran a snake through the pipe and removed a big quantity of hair in the pipe. After getting that out I cleaned the opening of the pipe back to the main drain back to its original opening of 1 1/2 inch. I then ran new PVC Pipe to the sink and gave the sink an all new plumbing for draining. When I turned on the water it drained as fast as I could run the water. This was all well and good except for the big 4ft by 8ft area in the ceiling that I had to remove to replace the plumbing. Since the house was so old the ceiling was plaster so how was I going to replace that. Fortunately My father taught me how to do most everything that is associated with the building of a house I figured out how to close this big opening. I used plywood (1/4 inch) to replace the slats that had to be removed to gain access to the pipes. Then I used 1/2 moisture and mold resistant dry wall to close the hole. The process of taping and reapplying the dry wall covering I am leaving to my daughter. I taught her how to do this kind of repairs a long time ago. Besides I think she needs to do a little in the house after all it is her house. I probably will have to do all this at some other time when I go down. After two days of climbing the ladder and doing everything in my power to get totally filthy in fixing the plumbing I figured that I had my fill of getting dirty at this time. The hole was covered and the plumbing was fixed. The rest is all cosmetic. It might not look all finished at this time but at least everything is working at this time. I just wanted to get home for a couple of days to relax. So I came home pulling a trailer full of stuff that we had taken to her house a few months ago when we thought we were selling the house. However that is another story for some other time.