1. Move to Italy.

2. Rent an apartment from Landlady.

3. Sit back and wait for the plumbers.

We were awakened this morning, waaay too early, by Shaved Head Guy from downstairs. Seems we forgot to check the bucket last night before we went to bed, left the air conditioner on all night, and it was overflowing onto his porch.

"Seek to eliminate the problem," he shouted through the door. But in Italian, of course, which sounds a little less odd.

How I could forget to mention this, I don't know. I've had a lot on my mind lately, I guess.

So Bastard Plumber, formerly known as Middle, showed up late. No surprises there. He was flying solo today, and brought along a long snakey thing with which he proceeded to ream the pipes.

Which didn't help much, so he went down to his truck for a (gasp!) plunger, which did the trick.

Apparently, the problem was down below the bidet. Which I don't use, except for the odd footbath. (Hey, I'm American. We like to wash our entire bodies on a regular basis. Imagine that!)

He left my bathroom flooded and covered with mud. It did not, surprisingly, smell bad. Nevertheless, it took me a long time to scoop and wipe and mop it all up. That, and a prodigious amount of Mr. Clean. Or rather, as he is known in Italian, Mastro Lindo. In German, it's Mister Proper, which I've always gotten a kick out of. In Turkey, I used Marc instead, based on their truly surreal commercial involving opera-singing housewives who danced with mops in the town square. But I digress....

He also left me the plunger. Gosh, for me?

I can't help but wondering if somehow, someway, this is all my fault. Like, what if the Plumbers are such Bastards because somehow they've gotten a hold of this diary and know what I'm saying about them. But, as intriguing as this theory might be-- Hey, Dilettante says I'm an incompetent, lying, sneaky asshole who spends his spare time fucking rodents because his dick isn't big enough to satisfy a goat. Wait until she sees what I do to her toilet.-- it's just not plausible. First, they speak no English, and second, they've been incompetently screwing up this apartment for years before I even started this diary.

So it's not my fault.

But somewhere along the line, I must have picked up some bad plumber karma.

Although I shouldn't have mentioned the toilet.

The toilet, despite its Small Box of Chemicals Septic System™, is just about the only thing in this damn place that hasn't given me problems.

And I probably just jinxed it.

In other news, the washing machine is refusing to work.

Again.

Oh joy.