Our latest project, moved up due to leaks and other problems in the old ones, is replacing the master bathroom faucets. After reading online about how it works, I decided to buy them and install them myself. Sounds like famous last words, right? Well, it actually wasn’t terrible and would have been fairly easy if not for a couple of problems. I finished up Wednesday night with a sense of satisfaction, great relief, and a new appreciation for the plumbing profession. I learned a few things in the process:

1. Most sinks have shut-off valves between the water pipe in the wall and the supply line that leads to the faucet. They allow you to turn off the water just for that part of the faucet instead of shutting it off to the whole house. The old style has an oval-shaped handle and are often hard to turn. I learned that old style faucets, since they often doesn’t get used for decades at a time (ours probably hadn’t been touched since 1983), tend to develop internal problems. Once you close and open them for the first time in 25 years (to replace the faucet, for example), they often develop leaks on top of being very hard to turn. I needed a big wrench and lots of grunting.
2. Supply lines have two different types of connections. If you buy a line with the wrong kind of connection, like I unknowingly did, it won’t fit. Spending 30 minutes at 2:00am trying to screw the wrong connector onto your supply nipple doesn’t work. Neither does using a metal file in a futile attempt to file down the nipple to make them fit together. Asking the guy at Lowe’s instead can save you hours of frustration.
3. There’s a reason plumbers are expensive. Plumbers combine two different disciplines: uncomfortable physical labor and intelligent problem solving. Car and aircraft mechanics share this combination. I can’t tell you how many times I crawled under the sinks, squirmed my way out to check something, and wiggled back underneath. Or how many times I banged my head on the cabinets or sinks. Or how many times I had to turn wrenches at awkward angles. Or what was in the mysterious gray gunk I pulled out of the drains. I also can’t tell you how long I spent on Google reading DIY articles and looking at pictures to figure how what was wrong. Or what kind of shutoff valve I have, which is one of the main reasons I am hiring a professional to replace them instead of trying the job myself.

I am forever grateful that there are people out there who know more and can do the job better than I can. But I must say it feels good to look at those pretty brushed-nickel faucets and realize that with some help, I got this particular job done.