Lye to Me: A Recipe for Disaster
You will need:
A sink with a garbage disposal on one side.
The ingredients for homemade Szechuan shrimp (be sure to make way too much rice.)
A pot of coffee.
Two plungers (one that is marginally decent in quality, one that just looks like a plunger but doesn't really work.)
A bucket
A saucepan
A pint of Jagermeister
A large black bottle of lye which comes in its own protective plastic bag (that's how you can tell it's really dangerous, ergo, effective.)
A phillips-head screwdriver.
Make the Szechuan shrimp and eat it - Yummy! Be sure you eat dinner shortly before you need to leave for work; busy, busy, busy! Put the leftovers in a dish to take to work for lunch.
While cleaning up, and running late, just run all that leftover rice through the garbage disposal. Go take a shower and get ready for work.
Make a pot of coffee and, during that process you will discover that the sink is BADLY clogged.
Get the two plungers - you'll need to hold one in each hand; one to cover the garbage disposal maw (because some housemate or other has taken the maw-plug for some nefarious purpose or other), and the other to plunge the conduit to the main draain. Plunge vigorously for a long time, and get your shirt all wet.
Give up on the plungers (because by now both of your arms will be sore), and get out the black bottle of lye.
Use the saucepan and bucket to bail all of the standing water out of the sink. A nifty trick is to turn on the garbage disposal for a couple of seconds, which will push all the water out of that side into the sink you are bailing - thus making it easier to get most of the water out of the way.
Punch a hole in the seal on top. Pour about 6 cups of lye into the drain-sink.
NOTE: This is about 6 times the recommended amount of lye to use.
Let stand for fifteen minutes. You should probably let it stand for about a half an hour, or so but, since your ride to work is going to be coming in about 20 minutes, you don't have that luxury. Check out the brown foamy stuff that is sizzling in both sinks now, and be afraid - be very afraid. Plunge a little too vigorously, and splatter some lye on your hands and arms just so you know for sure that the warning about lye burns on the black bottle are correct.
Give up, change your soaking shirt, and go work a 12-hour shift where you end up chasing a runaway heroin addict kid around town for two hours, almost get hit by a 90-year-old woman driving an Escalade way too fast in heavy traffic, and lose your cigarettes in the process.
Go home and get back to business!
Plunge vigorously (using both plungers, of course), and then - EUREKA - here's another nifty trick you can do with your garbage disposal. Take the "good" plunger and block the drain-sink. Then, pressing down on the plunger, turn on the garbage disposal to build up pressure in the pipes - this just MIGHT blow the clog out... But, it won't. You will also find that you won't be able to hold onto the plunger. The resulting jet of lye and pipe-emesis will shoot all over the freaking place. Be sure, when it hits your face, that your EYES ARE CLOSED.
Lye burns, and the only way to get it off is to sluice it with water, which makes it burn more. Spent 20 minutes under the shower making sure that you have removed every molecule of lye from your face and body.
NOTE: Chicks dig burns (it kicks in their mothering instincts) - first (and even second) degree burns are more painful than dangerous, don't be a wimp!!
Call the Roto-Rooter guy, pay him $100, and he'll unclog the sink.
Drink 1/3 - 1/2 of the Jagermeister and go to bed.
Bon appetit!
I have to go put some more aloe on my face, neck, and arms, and clean the kitchen now. The rest of the Jager is for solace, later.
Make the Szechuan shrimp and eat it - Yummy! Be sure you eat dinner shortly before you need to leave for work; busy, busy, busy! Put the leftovers in a dish to take to work for lunch.
While cleaning up, and running late, just run all that leftover rice through the garbage disposal. Go take a shower and get ready for work.
Make a pot of coffee and, during that process you will discover that the sink is BADLY clogged.
Get the two plungers - you'll need to hold one in each hand; one to cover the garbage disposal maw (because some housemate or other has taken the maw-plug for some nefarious purpose or other), and the other to plunge the conduit to the main draain. Plunge vigorously for a long time, and get your shirt all wet.
Give up on the plungers (because by now both of your arms will be sore), and get out the black bottle of lye.
Use the saucepan and bucket to bail all of the standing water out of the sink. A nifty trick is to turn on the garbage disposal for a couple of seconds, which will push all the water out of that side into the sink you are bailing - thus making it easier to get most of the water out of the way.
Punch a hole in the seal on top. Pour about 6 cups of lye into the drain-sink.
NOTE: This is about 6 times the recommended amount of lye to use.
Let stand for fifteen minutes. You should probably let it stand for about a half an hour, or so but, since your ride to work is going to be coming in about 20 minutes, you don't have that luxury. Check out the brown foamy stuff that is sizzling in both sinks now, and be afraid - be very afraid. Plunge a little too vigorously, and splatter some lye on your hands and arms just so you know for sure that the warning about lye burns on the black bottle are correct.
Give up, change your soaking shirt, and go work a 12-hour shift where you end up chasing a runaway heroin addict kid around town for two hours, almost get hit by a 90-year-old woman driving an Escalade way too fast in heavy traffic, and lose your cigarettes in the process.
Go home and get back to business!
Plunge vigorously (using both plungers, of course), and then - EUREKA - here's another nifty trick you can do with your garbage disposal. Take the "good" plunger and block the drain-sink. Then, pressing down on the plunger, turn on the garbage disposal to build up pressure in the pipes - this just MIGHT blow the clog out... But, it won't. You will also find that you won't be able to hold onto the plunger. The resulting jet of lye and pipe-emesis will shoot all over the freaking place. Be sure, when it hits your face, that your EYES ARE CLOSED.
Lye burns, and the only way to get it off is to sluice it with water, which makes it burn more. Spent 20 minutes under the shower making sure that you have removed every molecule of lye from your face and body.
NOTE: Chicks dig burns (it kicks in their mothering instincts) - first (and even second) degree burns are more painful than dangerous, don't be a wimp!!
Call the Roto-Rooter guy, pay him $100, and he'll unclog the sink.
Drink 1/3 - 1/2 of the Jagermeister and go to bed.
Bon appetit!
I have to go put some more aloe on my face, neck, and arms, and clean the kitchen now. The rest of the Jager is for solace, later.
posted by b at 12:26 AM
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