Sunday, December 22, 2019

Oh crap!

7:56 am - Sunday - December 22nd - Ramona, CA - 43° F, 65% humidity, wind - CALM.....overcast today with a forecast high of 65° F.

You just never now what is around the corner, do you?  You go to bed with a smile upon your face, and wake up at 3 am to find the Dometic 310 toilet you installed back in October of 2011 has given up the ghost, and will not flush.  The foot pedal you depress to flush the toilet snaps as you depress it for the 24,000th time in the last 8+ years, and suddenly you are faced with having to get dressed to go to the bathroom (park restroom across the street from us), which is really unacceptable, right?

So, at 3 am in the morning I am looking up Dometic 310 toilets on my smart phone.....we paid $141.00 for our toilet back in 2011, but now they run anywhere from $176-$230, and they are readily available from any number of sources (eBay, Amazon, CampingWorld, etc.), so I go to bed with a solution in my mind.

As I am getting back in bed TLE rolls over and wakes up briefly......I advise her the toilet is broken, but at least the 'flap' is open so it can be used, but you just cannot fill the bowl with water, or flush it.  She says 'okay', and goes back to sleep.  In the morning I am still formulating a plan of action.  I really was looking forward to not having to go out and drive anywhere in the terrible holiday traffic which has enveloped this region, and I find I can get a new toilet delivered by Amazon by Sunday morning......okay, that's great, so I tap the 'Buy It Now' button, confirm which address to ship it to, and then get a message saying Amazon cannot ship to that address, or apparently any address in California.....doh!  What the problem is I have no idea, but I do know it will not be shipped here by Amazon.  The other two sources cannot get it hear until after Christmas so now I am faced with having to drive down to San Marcos to the local CampingWorld which has them in stock.  I know this will be a 2+ hour round trip, and reluctantly get into the VW with TLE and begin the trip.......

The bone colored Dometic 310 installed 10/28/2011......

......we arrive at CampingWorld, without incident, around 10:45 am, quickly latch onto another Dometic 310 toilet, pay for it, and are back  in the VW on our way back home before 11 am.

About this time I look down at the gas gauge and see that the 'low fuel' light will be on before we get home, and the best local price for premium unleaded is at the San Marcos COSTCO ($3.45/gallon), just a few miles away, so we head there to refuel.  We arrive at a jam packed COSTCO fuel station, but get in line anyway.  TLE takes over the driving position, whilst I walk in to COSTCO to go the bathroom.....by the time I return she has refueled, and has just pulled away from the pump....perfect!

We arrive back home about 11:55 am, unpack the new toilet.....uh oh, it's white, and we thought we had picked up the bone colored one (matches the sink color in the bathroom)......oh well......I then proceed to dump the black tank.....I want that thing empty when I remove the old toilet, right?  I get the tank dumped pretty quickly, then proceed to remove the 8 year old Dometic 310, which comes out pretty easily......

 ......met its demise 12/21/2019

 You can see that the plastic shaft connecting the flushing pedal with the flapper has snapped causing catastrophic failure of the mechanism

......and then proceed to install the new, white Dometic 310....this one has a wooden seat, by the by.......much nicer than the former plastic seat on the old one.  I have the new toilet installed, and the carpet replaced just before 1 pm......less than 10 hours after the demise of the old toilet.......

 The new, white Dometic 310

 Nice, solid wood seat and cover


The supply line is reconnected.....there are no leaks!

......I spent the rest of the day watching 3 NFL games that were being televised Saturday, because the college season is now over.  The final game of the day featuring the L.A. Rams at the San Francisco 49ers was a very good game, and was won in the last seconds with a 32 yard field goal by the 49er place kicker.....34-31 was the final score as the clock hit ZERO.

We then watched 'Angel Has Fallen', the third in a series (Olympus Has Fallen-2013, and London Has Fallen-2016 were the first two) featuring Mike Bannon (played by Gerard Butler) who is a Secret Service agent tasked with guarding the President.  We loved this 3rd installment just as much as the first two, if not more.

And that was our Saturday.....thanks for stopping by!

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