Don't flush money down a leaky toilet

San Juan Capistrano, California (Oct 19 2004) -- October is National Toilet-Repair Month

Everyone knows what month this is, correct? Yes, it is October. Good answer.

But we’re searching for a more significant answer, one that shows you’re flush with knowledge about the special designation this particular month has.

OK, sir. You in the back there — the one with the large pipe wrench dangling from your belt.

Yes, that’s right, it’s National Toilet-Repair Month.

It’s true. We couldn’t possibly invent something like this.

Who says it is? Why, the fine folks at Fluidmaster say so. Fluidmaster just happens to be the nation’s largest manufacturer of toilet tank replacement parts. Quite naturally, you wouldn’t expect Fluidmaster to declare it National Lawnmower Repair Month.

Now, October isn’t the only month that you can repair your toilet, but it is the month that Fluidmaster has chosen to nag you about it. You definitely need to be nagged if the toilet in your house hasn’t stopped running for two months.

August, for instance, is the month Talk fixed the toilet at our house. OK, maybe we didn’t fix it. Our wife did. She’s the fix-it person in our household.

Talk doesn’t have much of a clue about fixing anything. The inside of our toilet tank looks more complex to us than the wiring for the space shuttle.

Fortunately, our wife was able to fix our leaky toilet in 10 minutes with a $4 part. A professional plumber probably would have charged us approximately $372 for the same parts and labor. As you can see, home toilet repair can be very beneficial.

(Toilet repair can be fun, too. While our wife fixed the toilet, we took a little pleasure ride through the blue water on the Tidy Bowl Man’s motorboat.)

If you need further proof that toilet use is an important part of life in this country, check out a few other facts from Fluidmaster:

Americans flush away 4.8 billion gallons of water every day. Each member of a family of three flushes a toilet four times per day. (If your Uncle Earl lives in your basement apartment, that average goes up to six times per day.)
Toilet flushing accounts for 38 percent of household water use. (Why, that’s almost one-third!)
Of this country’s 150 million toilets, approximately one in four leak water. (We’re not even going to attempt the math on that one.)
One leaky toilet can waste enough water in one year to fill a small swimming pool. (You know, we’ve always wanted a pool but couldn’t afford it. Perhaps if we just dig a hole beside our leaky downstairs toilet, we’ll have a pool by next summer.)
The word “plumbing” is derived from the Latin word “plumbum,” meaning lead, because early plumbers used lead to make pipes and fixtures. (And the word “toilet” is derived from the Latin word “stinkum,” because, well, you know.)
Thomas Crapper is credited, in some circles, with patenting the first flush toilet in England in the late 1800s. (Go ahead and float your own joke here.)

As you can clearly see, having an intimate knowledge of your toilet tank can lead to a happier and healthier life.

Fluidmaster states that the majority of toilet leaks are caused by a worn flapper. Talk can vouch for that. There’s definitely nothing worse than a worn flapper. This, of course, requires you to constantly jiggle the toilet tank handle. Before our wife fixed the toilet, we spent 38 percent of our day (that’s almost a third) jiggling our handle. Boy, that’s no fun at all.

That’s why we’re asking everyone to do his or her American duty and get the toilet repaired this month.

If you can’t figure out how to do it yourself, we suggest using Fluidmaster’s handy tips on the Internet. Or you could call an actual plumber.

Just don’t call Talk’s wife. We have her out back working on the lawnmower.