Diking a Leak and Moving a Mountain.

Started back to work recently, and got shuffled to a new remodel job on Mutiny Bay Road.  One of our tasks was to remove the appliances. The refrigerator in this house was a Sub-Zero. A big one. Really big.

In retrospect, we could have removed the island first. But we didn't. So we pulled the fridge out, and did the requisite wiggle behind to disconnect the power and water.

Any one who's done this knows that water shut offs are conveniently tucked into an inconveniently small box. So it's not like you can grab the faucet handle and turn it with your fingers around it. The back of the box is about a quarter of an inch from the handle. So I did the righty-tighty thing until it snugged down, and began to loosen the nut holding the copper tube to the spigot.

Gusher!

Well, thinking that the valve was shut, I sent the co-worker off to shut off the water. That meant around the corner to the left, then the right, immediate right, down some stairs, and three feet off the edge of the concrete in the crawl space dirt was the shut off. I was yelling the directions as he was looking, he got it done, and then we had to bleed the system. All the while I have my thumb over the spigot opening. My shirt was soaked, my pants, gloves, and we didn't necessarily lose that much water.

It seemed like this system had a lot of water in it. Perhaps the feeder to this fride ran all over the house before it came to the fridge. Sure seemed that way. So we finally scrounged one of my tool buckets and collected the rest of the water from the spigot. It was then that I decided to see if the spigot was broken. It was in fact, despite it's pristine appearance, rather stuck half open. I finally got it closed.

Then had to skooch it around the island so we could lay it over on it's aback to tip it over to clear the header between the kitchen and media room for it's trip out the front door. This fridge had the compressor on top, and so wasn't going to fit out any door to make it's way to the drive way. So over onto it's back to get out of the kitchen because the low ceiling even prevented a sideways tip. Oof. This thing was heavy. At the front door,we stood it up again, and then tipped it on it's side to clear the front door, but the side ways tip presented an issue: with the compressor on top, we couldn't maintain a hold on the dolly. So we laid it down, and I grabbed the top of the fridge and lifted as much as possible while my co-worker pushed from the bottom to get it down the three front steps.

While balancing it so it wouldn't tip over.

Are we having fun yet!? Well, I was laughing.....

In the end, we did it. And the good news is that a local thrift store took all the appliances. My employer, Gemkow Construction, is greenin' out. We recycled all the trim as well as the appliances. The built in cabinet is at my house. The pool table went to some one's house. The garage cabinets, a bathroom for the local rodents, were chipped up for ground cover. It's very cool. Toilet's and sink and carpet fragments found new homes.

All that by break time. Soakin wet, yet laughing. What a way to start the day!