Waterless (Briefly)

My town will be putting a new water main on my street. A preliminary step was to run pipes from the  fire hydrants and hoses from the pipes to each house, enabling them to shut off the water from the original main. So now our water comes through a hose which is hooked up to an outdoor spigot.

Yesterday, the people from the lawn sprinkler company came to activate the sprinkler system — turn it on and test the four zones to make sure the sprinkler heads were working properly. When they started testing the second zone, there was a loud knocking sound, and the water stopped flowing — not only to the sprinkler system, but to the whole house. The sprinkler technicians couldn't figure out how to restart it and suggested I call the Water Department.

A notice I had recently received from the private company which had been hired to do the work on the water main gave a telephone number to call if there was no water to the house. I called and presently a man arrived. (He looked just like the 30-something pastor of the Evangelical church in town.) He did some checking and decided that the problem lay somewhere between the outdoor spigot and the shut-off valve in the cellar, which could be used to shut down the spigot for the winter.

After poking at the spigot for a bit. he reattached the hose and asked if there was another spigot he could attach the hose to. There is, and he checked that out. It was very stiff, and after opening it, he couldn't shut it completely. It kept dripping. But at some point while he had it open, the water started gushing out. Whatever he had done to the first spigot had fixed the problem. He found the interior shut-off valve in the cellar for the second spigot and was able to stop the drip. He noted that both spigots were very old (Maybe they are original equipment from when the house was built in the late 1930's.) and he suggested that when the water main project is finished, I get a plumber to replace them.

So overall, I was waterless for maybe two hours, and the sprinkler people and I think it would br foolish to try to use the automatic sprinkler system until the work on the water main in finished. Meanwhile, to keep the grass green, I'll need to set out and move sprinklers by hand. It's not a bad thing to have to do, especially since I'm around most of the day anyway, but it's been several years since I had to do it.