Personal Development Training and Motivational Humor from the Motivational Smart Ass!

As much as I would like to meet Mario, I did not want to call a plumber...

I recently posted about my experience going to Lowe’s to buy a pipe snake to unclog my kitchen sink. I did not however, recount how the mighty “Avish vs. Clog” story turned out. It had an interesting resolution to it, and I think there is a good lesson to be learned from it.

If you don’t remember that post and/or are too lazy to go read it, here’s a quick recap of the situation: I was cooking dinner. I discovered that my kitchen sink was clogged. This had happened before and it cost me over $200 to have a plumber fix it. Not wanting to pay that again, I decided I would attempt to fix it myself.

This is where things get a little interesting. You see, when it happened before, the plumber came out and snaked my drain (get your mind out of the gutter, smartass). I of course now assumed it was the same, or similar, problem, and that I would have to snake the drain myself. So I did what any intellectual who’s not good at fixing things would do: I looked up “how to snake a drain” on the internet!

I came across lots of good articles and some good videos, and frankly, they made it look pretty simple. In addition, I came across a few other simple solutions that people suggested I try first:

1. Check the “P” Trap – There’s a curved pipe under the sink that creates a seal that keeps your home from smelling like sewage. This is also a place where clogs can commonly occur. But at the moment, checking the trap seemed like a lot of work. And I was eager to go out and buy a snake, because that’s what I knew I needed to do to fix the problem.
2. Run the garbage disposal for 1-2 minutes – This made no sense to me. Last time the problem was much deeper down the drain. The disposal just churned the water in the sink. Even though I knew this wouldn’t do anything, I ran the disposal for thirty seconds or so, and just like I suspected, nothing happened. (See how smart I was there? Ah hubris, what would we do without you?)
3. Use a sink plunger – I don’t own a sink plunger. Turns out, I don’t own a toilet plunger either, and that’s a thought that’s going to hang with me every time I go out for cheeseteaks until I get one. Besides, I knew the clog was very deep, and I figured the plunger was only good for clogs that were near the top.

Before running out to Lowe’s, I spoke with a friend who is good at this type of stuff. He also suggested that I check the P-trap. I was pretty sure that wasn’t the problem, but I figured I may as well check before spending time and money. I pulled out a wrench and dismantled the trap, and sure enough, it was completely clean. I also ran some water through the garbage disposal, just to make sure there was nothing caught in there. There was not.

I was now fully reinforced in my belief that only a pipe snake could solve this problem! So I went to Lowe’s (over Home Depot, and where I met man who was talking to himself), bought my snake, and returned home eager to fix my problem.

Things did not go quite as planned…

Attempt #1: I start feeding the snake into the pipe, navigating the pipe’s twists and turns as best I can. Finally, I get to a point where the snake will go no further. Ah ha! I must be at the clog. I work this clog for quite a while, but no luck getting through it. At this point it has been about an hour or so, and since I am entering the pipe from under the kitchen sink, I am hunched over and getting very sore. I decide to throw in the towel for the evening, and try again the next day.

Attempt #2: I did some more internet research on how to use the snake (that whole “intellectual” thing, remember – we like to read about how to do stuff more than we like to actually do it…). With renewed hope I re-attack the drain. But I get stuck at the same point. After about another hour of attempting, I throw in the towel again, wondering if I will ever be able to fix this myself.

Attempt #3: A little more research reveals that sometimes the snake can turn the wrong way and bump into a grating or something. This is a disturbing thought, as I have no idea whether I am turning the right way. But I need to try one more time. Again, I work for close to an hour. I get it to the point where it usually gets stuck. I am slowly working it, twisting the snake, when all of the sudden, my snake gets a kink in it! (mind. out. of. the. gutter. please…) This now makes the snake unusable to go any further than this point.

Saddened, I admited defeat. I need to call in professional help. Unfortunately, I am entering a six day stretch where I will not be around to let a plumber in to my condo.

My sink was still draining very slowly, so I figure at the very least I can do the dishes that have been piling up by doing them in batches. Wash a batch until the sink fills it, let it drain over a few hours, and then do another batch, and so on and so on.

I do this for one batch in the evening, and then another batch the next morning. Unfortunately, when I came that evening I found that the sink had not drained at all! My slowly draining sink had turned into a completely stopped up sink. Now I felt like I was going to go away the next morning with a load of undone dishes and a sink full of water. Not good. Not good.

In desperation, and willing to try anything, I revisited some of the earlier suggestions. Namely, the “run the garbage disposal for 1-2 minutes” one. I flip on the disposal and let it run for a while. Guess what happened next.

Ready for it?

Yup. All of the sudden, before we had even hit the two minute mark, I hear a short “gurgle” noise and the sink starts to drain! I stared in disbelief for a moment or two. Then I turned off the disposal, turned on the water, and let the it run for a couple of minutes. Sure enough, it continued to drain just fine.

Oh. My. God.

Do you mean to tell me that I could have just taken two minutes the first time and ran the disposal and this problem would have been fixed? If not, would the sink plunger have done the trick? If I had just listened to the advice of people who knew and let the disposal run for longer than the token 30 seconds I did on my first attempt, I could have saved $25 for the snake and close to 5 hours of time, all together? Really?

Talk about feeling like an idiot.

I realize that it’s possible that all my snaking loosened things up or created a situation where the suctions created by the disposal would be enough to clear the clog. But I’ll never know…

There are important lessons here:

Make No Assumptions About Solutions!

When you have a solution in mind, you find evidence to support that solution. I was certain that I would need to use a pipe snake. As such, I discounted solutions that didn’t need one. I was also quick to see evidence that said, “yes, you need to use a pipe snake here.”

Make No Assumptions About Problems!

When this problem happened before, the plumber claimed that the clog was 50 feet or so down my drain. So I naturally assumed that this would be the same situation. Based on one past experience I assumed I knew exactly what the problem was, even though I had no clue.

Follow a Process!

Most problems with an uncertain cause have solutions that follow a process from easiest to hardest, and from cheap to expensive. If you are going to tackle a problem yourself, follow that process fully! Don’t jump steps because you think you know better. It may seem like a pin in the ass when you think you no the problem and the solution, but a step by step method of checking things in order of difficulty can ultimately save you a lot of time, energy, and money.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I am going to go run my kitchen sink for five minutes. Just because I can…

Here’s a motivational quickie for the day (get your mind out of the gutter):

If you want to unleash your brilliance, ask yourself, “Would an idiot do that?” If they would, then do not do that thing.

Yes, sometimes it really is just that simple…

Ahh, duct tape. Is there anything you can not do?

My friend Terry Ryan passed along a link to an article titled, “The Duct Tape Programmer”. If you happen to be a computer programmer you should check it out, it’s a good read. If you don’t know the difference between c+ and Password Plus, well, then you may not enjoy or understand the article so much. But there is a lesson there that translates over from the world of computer programming into the world of Motivational Smart Assery…

To sum up, the article says there are programmers who approach coding from an academic perspective and try to write programs that use the newest and theoretically “best” approach, and then there are programmers who just get in there and “bang out code.” The latter are who he calls, “Duct Tape Programmers.”

The academics get stuck over analyzing the approach and never get started. The Duct Tapers roll up their sleeves and get to work. The academics, in their quest for the best solution, create code so complicated code that is more likely to crash. The Duct Tapers use simpler methods that are easier to maintain and more stable.

This is not to say that Duct Tapers don’t think through their code before writing or constantly try to learn and improve themselves. They are simply more considered with getting things done that work well and don’t break.

It is quite possible that you will never write a line of code in your life. However, these ideas apply to any other area of life as well.

Some people are so desperately looking for the perfect solution that they never take action. Others try to follow systems so complicated that they always fall apart. I covered the idea of simplicity vs. complexity in a recent blog post.

Have you ever put off doing a project because you felt the need to create an elaborate organizational system first? Are you avoiding taking a class because you are still (and have been for a while) hunting for a recommendation for the best teacher in the city? Do you ever get paralyzed in a restaurant trying to decide between two items because you are not sure which is the best?

Research, organization, forethought, and planning are all fine things, and should be used. But they need to be balanced with action.

I fall into this trap myself. When I embark on something new, I like to read everything I can about it to come up with the best plan possible. One example of this is working out. I will study up on all the theories of muscle growth and fat loss, read articles on the best heart rate to work out at, and compile info on the most efficient ways to get in shape. Unfortunately, all this information often either leads to an overload where I take no action while trying to figure it out or a fizzling out of the routine as I lose momentum in following a complicated and difficult plan. I would be better off simply following any less than 100% efficient plan and sticking to it.

Studying up to find the best course of action is great. Refusing to do anything until you find the absolute best course of action in lunacy. As the old saying goes, “an ounce action is worth a pound of theory.”

Two questions for you:

• Does your analysis prevent you from starting?
• Does your attempt to do things the “best” way cause you to fail?

If you answered yes to either of these questions, you may need to start applying a little duct tape to your life…

Double Parking - Aaaaaaaaargh!
(Photo by richardmasoner)

Yesterday, I was driving in the city of Philadelphia down a two way street, with one lane going each way. There was a car in front of me who then stops, puts on his flashers, and double parks.

Double parking is a terribly annoying practice in Philly, but you learn to live with it. Here’s the kicker in this situation: There was an open parking spot right next to this guy!

He could easily, in about 20 seconds, have pulled into a parking spot rather than stopping up traffic. But instead, he did what was most convenient for himself and just stopped in the middle of the road. I was stuck behind him, and one or two cars were behind me.

This was clearly no Mensa student. He must have assumed that I would not be able to figure out from his flashing hazards and total lack of motion that I should drive around him. He lowers his window and “waves” me past (Again, this took only marginally less effort than pulling into the parking spot in the first place). I couldn’t drive around him at the moment though because there was traffic coming the other way. Our friend the double parker was clearly no Sherlock Holmes, however, as he seemed to take my lack of passing him as a sign that I could not decipher what his “waving hand motion” meant. So he stuck his arm out the window and waved me past again, only this time more forcefully, as if to say, “don’t worry about the oncoming traffic, I’m sure you could win a head on collision. Please, just drive around me so I don’t have to feel guilty about stopping up traffic.” Again, this took only marginally less effort then simple pulling into the parking spot.

Of course I, in my own bought of temporary idiocy, yell at him, “I can’t go around, there are cars coming!” I say temporary idiocy because my windows were all shut and there was clearly no way he could hear me. But on some level I believe he could cosmically sense my disapproval.

When the traffic cleared I passed around him and tried desperately to catch a clear glimpse of the star in this one man dumbassery production, but alas, I saw nothing. I may be one of the few drivers in the world who takes the phrase, “keep your eyes on the road,” relatively seriously.

Double parking is a pain in the butt, but I get it. If there is no parking and you are just going to be a minute while you run in to pick something up or wait for someone to come to your car (and it’s a two lane road), I understand. However, if you double park when there are ample parking spaces available for you to pull in to, then you are just a lazy, selfish, inconsiderate jerk. You are basically saying, “Rather than inconvenience myself for thirty seconds, I am going to inconvenience a whole lot of other people for even longer than that, even if it means I will technically be breaking the law by stopping my car in the middle of traffic.” Stupid.

You may be thinking, “so what? Why should I care if others are inconvenienced?” If so, then to you I say firstly, “shut up.” Interestingly, the people who say this are also the people who are most likely to get crazy angry when someone does something to inconvenience them. It’s like the old saying goes, “Hell hath no hypocrisy like a dumbass inconvenienced.”

Secondly, we live in a society. Society’s better themselves when people are willing to take on minor inconveniences for the betterment of all. This is the cornerstone of volunteerism, charity, recycling and the entire green movement, etc. It’s easy to understand this idea when it comes to big specific efforts like these. It’s harder to realize this when it comes to daily activities where you are not consciously trying to be charitable.

Pay attention to how you can apply this yourself. When you are driving, pull into a parking spot instead of double parking, When walking down the sidewalk, move out of the line of pedestrian traffic when you decide to stop to and tie your shoelace. Use your “inside voice” when talking on your cell phone (or to yourself) in public. Don’t get to the top of an escalator or the middle of a doorway and pick that exact moment to stop and try to figure out which way to go when there are people behind you. Have your money ready when you are buying a coffee at Starbucks instead of ordering then rooting around in your pocket, wallet or purse for five minutes (you know how much it is! and you know who you are…). Simple, tiny little things that take almost no time or effort but that also make other people’s lives just a tiny bit easier.

Maybe with a few simple steps we can make society a better, more considerate place. And maybe we can truly make Philadelphia the “City of Brotherly Love.”

Ok, that may be wishful thinking, but a guy’s gotta try, right…?