The trouble with plumbing is that while it’s essential, it’s the last thing that comes to mind. It’s one of those things that works behind the scenes but is never noticed, so if anything goes wrong, no one knows it until the last minute, when everything is spewing fluids all over the place and people are sputtering and drowning and the whole thing is just broken almost beyond repair.

Anyway, a while ago, my bathroom sink started leaking.

My first indication of it was wet feet, but I thought it was from me dripping on the bathroom floor after my Hollywood—read, 15-minute and not Hitchcock’s Psycho—shower.

My second indication of the leak was wet sock-clad feet, but I thought it was from the cat in a freaky fit of incontinence after I made her laugh so hard over that really bad pussy joke—which is really kind of a feat considering that, well, you know how only the Irish can tell Irish jokes and only black people can tell black people jokes? Well… oh… you know what, never mind.

My third indication was of me nearly slipping and hitting my head on the counter, spilling my puny plaid brains all over the place and totally messing up the tasteless decor, but I thought it was from my sloppy job of mopping up the floor in my cleaning of the bathroom—kind of a necessary chore, you know, with the pony leaving all those long black tail and mane hairs all over the place.

So I wiped up the mess all three times, never thinking that anything was wrong.

And then it dawned on me that, hey, it was the sink that was dripping and peeing and leaving that sloppy mess on the floor, and because the bathtub is a jealous type and can’t stand that anyone other than itself would get any attention, the bathtub started leaking, too.

So there, in the time that I have been trying to schedule and reschedule an appointment with a new gynecologist—which is quite another story, let me tell you—my bathroom has been weeping and leaking heavily, bitching and moaning, and absolutely complaining that I never listen to her or do anything for her, all in that hysterical leave-me-alone kind of way, and boy, did that really piss me off.

The only one allowed to have PMS in my household is me. Let me make that clear.

Needless to say, I called the property management and made all kinds of arrangements. I also stopped brushing my teeth. Not completely, mind you. Just at the bathroom sink, because the bathroom sink not only leaked at the bottom, but at the top. If you turned the tap, the water would come out of everything but the faucet. It would come out at the knobs and the plugs, out the pipes beneath the sink. Heck, it would come out of my very own nose before it came out of the faucet, so I started brushing my teeth at the kitchen sink.

Please do not scour the pots with my toothbrush, thank you. If I get plague plaque, I am blaming it all on the sink.

But to make a short story long, I somehow got the plumber to come in and replace the sink entirely and tighten up the washers in the bathtub faucets, too—but only after I made sure that every piece of furniture in the place was moved at least twice, every box packed, unpacked, and moved at least three times, and every black-haired cat scared beneath the bed by the vacuum cleaner at least five times, and then some, because I absolutely cannot have anyone in the condo, be they plumber or president, unless the place is properly presentable. So, yeah.

As of yesterday, my sink is like new.

Now if only I can finally see that gynecologist for another kind of plumbing. Like I said, it’s quite another story, fraught with cancellations and rescheduling, where if it isn’t one thing it’s another—wrong time of the month for a check-up, doctor calling in sick, lunch meeting remembered at the last minute, and my die-hard insistence that I get a board-certified doctor and not some midwife from the medieval times with a lot of leeches and lice carrying the bubonic plaque plague. Because, you know, I have had problems before.

So I have been trying to see my doctor since July, and if all goes well, I might finally, just maybe, get my wish in late October.

Whew! Thank God I don’t leak all over the place like the bathroom sink did; I don’t think the sight would be pretty. And at least now, I’m the only one in the household who gets PMS.

Just like it should be.

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