dandy

Local sewer company Jim Dandy began work today. With a backhoe they dug up the parking strip in front of the house to expose the sewer there; then they must have packed the sewer line with dynamite, because a bit later we got a call saying that they were able to make a tiny, tiny hole—an inch or so in diameter—through the roots, which means water can now drain. Three cheers!

I asked Bruce, the company's estimator, whether we could just leave it like this and call it a day. (We're somewhere between $3 and $4K now.) He said that technically, yes, you could leave it like this for a while, but you'd have to have someone out to clear the line every month or so because the roots will continue growing. I guess what we think of as "sewage," trees think of as "nutrition." So on Monday they will continue as planned, opening up the street to replace the "curb-to-stub" section of sewer pipe.