Don't Eat Quite Yet...

Well, we have had an exciting past couple of days! Our bathtub and sinks backed up! Yay! We were going to post pictures, but after reading this post, you'll be grateful we didn't.

Jill was taking a shower one day and noticed that the water was coming up around her ankles. Red flag! Then David tried to use a plunger over the drain to suck out whatever it was that was clogging the drain. Chunks of what we hope was sediment started floating up, and David kept plunging away, but to no avail.
So, with a bathtub full of brown floaties, we decided to call a plumber. Josh was over at our house, and he and Jill sat watching a movie while the plumber went to work. After a lot of banging, splashing, and groaning, a very frustrated plumber stumbled out of the bathroom and said, "I can't fix it. Your pipes are old, and I don't have the right equipment. No charge." Then he left.
Jill then went into the bathroom to see what he had done. The tub water was just as high as it had always been, except now it was black. It was so black that Jill couldn't even see the bottom of the tub. Also, the lovely plumber had ripped a board off of the wall to see the piping. Yes, he ripped an old, nasty board off of the wall, and left a gaping hole. Not only that, but he also decided to put that 50-year-old board on top of a pile of clean towels. Lovely, lovely plumber.
The next day though, we had another guy come to try and fix the problem. Neither of us were home when this guy came in. When we got home, however, he had left a note on the door saying that the problem was fixed! We were overjoyed and skipped into our bathroom to see our newly fixed bathtub.
Oh my gosh.
Had a slug the size of a basketball crawled all over our the walls? There were black flecks of sludge, there were black streaks of sludge, there were black CHUNKS of sludge all over our walls! There was even a black handprint on one wall! Basically, our bathroom had been sludged! The whole room smelled like something had laid on the floor and died. It was absolutely disgusting. But, look on the bright side, there wasn't anymore water in our tub!
So today, after much mental preparation, Jill decided to take on this monster of a chore. Armed with a gas mask, rubber gloves, rain boots, and shovel, she plunged into the mess that was our bathroom. With her rag, she scrubbed and scrubbed, but the sludge seemed to keep growing back! At one point, she was leaning over the tub scrubbing at a tough spot, and a large chunk of sludge crawled across the tub floor and up her arm. She screamed, flicked it off, and whipped it with her rag, killing it instantly. She almost felt bad as it wriggled and squealed as it died.
FINALLY Jill had conquered the sludge. Triumphant, she took off her gas mask and took a huge sigh of relief. Shouldn't have done that. Sludge stench still hung in the air. As she choked, gasping for air, she grabbed the air spray and opened the window.
The bathroom glistened. The air smelled fresh and clean. Jill was happy.
As she put her cleaning supplies back under the sink, she discovered a small puddle of sludge. It laughed a deep, threatening laugh at her. She quickly sprayed it and scrubbed it away with her rag. As she did this, the sludge cried, "What a world, what a world!"
Needless to say, she threw the rag away.