December 31, 2009--New Year's Eve mini-disaster:

On the night of December 30th, I discovered a leak under our back patio. We had to turn all our water off that night and throughout the following day to prevent more water waste. I spent most of New Year's Eve trying to locate the source of the leak. My friend Rob Sorensen came over in the morning to help me for a few hours. Later, I rented a jack hammer from Home Depot and started busting up the side cement slabs to find the pipe.

It took all day, and Sebastian also came over in the afternoon and helped me bail out mud from the large hole I had dug. Together, we found the cracked pipe! In the spring, I'll be redoing the cement patio on the side of our back porch, between going to the Klondike Derby, the Spring Camporee, and other scouting activities!

Here I am jack hammering the side patio:

Here are 7 pipes under the patio:

And here is the culprit pipe! Look at the erosion on the elbow. We think this cost us about $1,000 in water, plus the repair work expenses this spring.