My Worst Nightmare

September 1st, Friday-I'm currently taking over work for a friend of mine while he's in Bali, which is synonymous with "hard to get ahold of in an emergency." Don't get me wrong. I love editing. And I love earning money. And I'm working out of his apartment, which is normally fine. Friday it was not fine. Raw sewage came up the pipes in the bathroom. Imagine my horror when the stuff in the toilet not only wouldn't go down, but moved up. It was like my worst nightmare had come true. (I'm not kidding. I'm the most germ-phobic person I know.) I called the landlord who said he couldn't do anything since it was a holiday weekend and he had no idea who I was. (I'm his tenant's friend who's looking after his apartment!) The landlord then left a message on my friend's voicemail, which I have access to, and proceeded to tell my friend that I had "done something" to his bathroom. I then called the landlord back to tell him that raw sewage was going to overflow into an apartment he owns. Couldn't he call a plumber to fix it, regardless of who he thinks caused the problem? Well, apparently not. He had a party to attend to and it was a holiday weekend. How nice for you, I've got RAW SEWAGE coming up the pipes!I had to call a plumber from the phone book and get him to unclog the main line, which was flushed out onto the front steps of my friend's apartment and onto the sidewalk. (RAW SEWAGE, people! On the sidewalk!) The landlord refused to pay for the repair and I paid for it myself. I also threw out nearly everything on the floor in my friend's bathroom and scrubbed it down. I later found out that this is the 4th time this has happened and that this landlord has been reprimanded by the city. Keep in mind, I'm working this whole time! Trying to keep myself from telling the clients, really, I can't talk to you right now, because I have to literally deal with crap. And it didn't help at all that I wasn't doing well with the digestion that day either. I'm still leery of using the toilet there. It's betrayed me once and I don't want it to do it again. I spent a good deal of today bleaching the place. And the cleaning lady is coming by Tuesday to sanitize again. Because you can never clean too much when raw sewage is involved. AAAArgh. I still can't get the horror of it out of my mind.