A word to new parents

Make sure any bath toys you have for your children are small enough to sail away to the great beyond, or are too big to be flushed at all.

I just spent two hours working on the kids' toilet because it wouldn't flush again.

When my family were here a few weeks ago the kids' toilet backed up and we attributed it to so many people using it. What had actually happened was that our daughter, who loves playing with the toilet (and who has been caught coming out of the bathroom drinking from a cup, but she can't reach the taps!!!), had sailed/flushed several small toy plastic boats down the loo, and all but one of them had made it. The "little boat which couldn't" had got stuck at the back of the toilet, up in behind the S-bend, and there it had stayed, snagging toilet paper and...other stuff, basically preventing the toilet from flushing properly.

I had to drain the toilet bowl and tank, which meant scooping water out of the bowl. Given that JE had used the toilet the night before, and it hadn't flushed properly then (and it was obvious it hadn't flushed, if you know what I'm saying), this was not a pleasant experience. Not...at...all.

I then siphoned the water out of the tank, mopped it dry, turned off the water at the wall, disconnected the pipe, and removed the tank. Then I mopped out the bowl, unbolted it from the floor, turned it over and there was this yellow & green (& brown) boat. I tried pushing it back out the way it had came but that didn't work. To get it out I needed to pull it a bit (carefully) then rotate it to get it out a little more, then rotate it, pull, etc until EUREKA!!! Out came the yellow & green (& brown) boat!

Then bolt the toilet back to the floor, put the tank back on, hook up the water, turn it back on, check for leaks (had one, tightened the appropriate nut. Leak! BE GONE!) wait for the tank to fill then FLUSH and away goes the water, just like it's supposed to! Yes!

I don't know how much I just saved us by not needing to call out a Plumber. I suspect it was in the vicinity of a few hundred dollars, unless the Plumber had some nifty gadget by which he could hook the boat and pull it back out without taking the toilet apart, and being a professional plumber he just might have some nifty gadget that allows him to do that. Even still, a Housecall for one Plumber needing to use a gadget to remove a blocked toilet, I'd guess in the realm of $200 or so.

I placed a bid on eBay for World of Warcraft:The Board Game. If I win it, I'll pay less than $60. After saving us at least $150, and most likely more, I think I can afford to buy myself a little present. WoW:TBG is more of a social game played not unlike old school Dungeons & Dragons, by a group of friends sitting around a table, playing & socializing. I bought it not because I love WoW:The Online Game, but because I see WoW:TBG as a way of having some fun with the family as a whole, rather than everyone sitting down on their own computer, doing their own thing.

It could be argued that as the objective of WoW:TBG is for one side (2 to 8 players) to defeat the other, it's not exactly family friendly, but as most board games are of the "complete the objective/defeat your opponents first" variety, I don't see how WoW:TBG is any different.

Yes, it's going to cost close to $60, but if you could see the amount of bits & pieces you get with this game, $60 is a fairly good price. RRP is $80+tax so I'm saving at least $20. Fix a toilet, save $150 or more. Buy WoW:TBG, save $20 or so ;)