Archive for May, 2010
4 items.
Bigger Version Here.
When the firefighters finally got into the apartment above ours, there was a single faucet just endlessly spewing hot water. We asked what the problem was, and their answer was basically “Somebody left the water on.” Now you must remember that nearly three hours had passed since we first noticed the dripping on the ceiling, so the apartment had been flooding at least that long. In reality though, for it to start seeping through the walls and into our apartment, the place upstairs would have to have already hit the brink. The idea that all the damage had been caused by the fact that someone could have been so careless as to forget to twist the nob on the faucet before heading out the door for several hours was totally and completely outrageous to us. Jonathan, more than anyone else, has particularly upset. He had spent more time than anyone else just trying to keep our apartment from losing anything more to the filthy waters.
After more investigation, the firefighters found that there actually was a problem with the pipes, and that the faucet could not be shut off. After receiving this diagnosis we chilled out a little and were even prepared to forgive the people upstairs. We never did actually meet the girls who live upstairs. To this day I have never seen them. I am glad we didn’t come across them during that time frame where we though they’d just been too lazy to shut off their sink though, or this might have actually happened.
In the end, our apartment suffered some horrible damages that it still hasn’t fully recovered from, but it was nowhere near as bad as the comic makes it out to be. We are still capable of living here. The girls upstairs though, their stuff was wrecked. most of their possessions took water damage and maintenance is still replacing stuff. We knew then that all these things were in their immediate future too. We didn’t envy them. I still remember that, when it was all said and done, after spending several more hours cleaning water out of the apartment and then bathing to get the sludge that came with it off of ourselves, we didn’t know what to do. We didn’t know if we would be penalized somehow for what had happened or if we’d have to pay for the damages. We weren’t sure what all had been destroyed. We were exhausted. And in that moment, at nearly 2:00 a.m., Jonathan proposed that we just say “To hell with it” and go eat pancakes at Kirby Lane.
They were some of the best pancakes I ever had.
On another note, this is (I think) the last comic for the Daily Texan this semester. It’s also the 50th comic of mine they’ve run so that’s oddly appropriate. I intend to keep drawing comics of some sort during the summer, but whether it will be a tWC thing or something else…I’m not sure yet. I’ll keep you posted though.
We never did get that wet carpet smell out of here.
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Ah yes. Back to our regularly scheduled programming.
Solomon and Cesar checked the apartment up stairs only to find that whoever lived there was not home. They could, however, hear the tell-tale sounds of flowing water coming from the other side of the door, so it was clear this was the source of the flooding.
Eventually Solomon and I switched places for a while, so he and Jonathan combated the water while Cesar and Subhash and I looked for some solution. After asking pretty much everyone in the apartment complex if they happened to know the girls that lived there or could somehow get in touch with them, we were informed that….well…everyone knew who they were, but nobody liked them. And vice versa. Apparently these two girls weren’t great at making friends.Which also meant no one could help us get a hold of them. Great.
Meanwhile, we called Maintenance, the people we rented the apartment from, even 911. Either the weren’t available at that hour or it just wasn’t a big enough emergency. Clearly we were on our own. Then we got the bright idea to ask the Fire Department, which we lived a couple of blocks away from. We had already been told the nature of our emergency was beneath 911’s notice so we thought it was a long shot, but Subhash, Solomon, and Cesar went down there anyway.
Roughly 5o minutes passed while Jonathan and I battled the flooding, and with water starting to come in from different rooms faster than we could fight it, things were looking pretty grim for our little apartment. Then, Suddenly, Cesar came in to inform us that the cavalry had arrived. The fire-fighters agreed to help, and were currently upstairs fighting the problem. According to Slomon, because the doors were looked and there was no easy way to go about it, they just busted their way in through a window. As they shined their light into the soaking apartment, all that could be seen was the steam of the piping hot water filling the entire place.
How did it all happen? The thrilling (ridiculous) conclusion when we return.
I know you all are dying to know what happened after the apartment flooded, but today just did not allow me to finish the second part on time (for the DT deadline, something I feel terrible about. I have since finished it, but I don’t like to post comics before they run in the paper so you know…)
Instead, we have our first quest strip, and it certainly lives up o the Weridest City’s title. Ryohei Yatsu of Elysium actually did this one for me back during the time frame of the switcheroo, and I’ve been saving it for a rainy day like this one where I’m down a comic but I don’t want to leave you hanging. He said it wasn’t supposed to make sense, but I hope you enjoy it anyway.
The Flood: Part 2 will be up on Friday, and conclude on Tuesday.
This is the story of how we all drowned.
Not really. It is a true story though, albeit slightly exaggerated. One night, we noticed an unusual dripping sound coming from what we presumed to be the ceiling. After looking high and low for the source, we figured it was nothing to worry about and went about our business. About twenty minutes later Jonathan noticed something like a larger water mark on the ceiling, but none of were sure if it had always been that bad. We assumed it had always been there.
After another twenty minutes or so, Cesar and Solomon discovered that our kitchen was under about 3 inches of water, and it was rising fast. At first we assumed a pipe had broken in the sink, so we checked it out. After some hasty inspection it turned out that the water was actually seeping in from the walls and coming down through the ceiling. Unsure of what to do and with water beginning to come in from different rooms faster than we could fight it, Solomon and Cesar went to find out what was going on upstairs while Jonathan and I stayed behind to push water out the door.
What I remember most clearly is that the water was still rising despite the fact that it was flowing out the open door. Over the course of two hours or so, the flow never let up. I think, if left unchecked, the kitchen would have been under nearly a foot of water, not to mention the rest of the apartment. It was also this murky brown color, which at first we feared might be sewage. What with the lack of a tell-tale aroma however, we figured it was just junk from inside the walls.
It took a good three hours for the situation to get resolved. How did it all turn out? Well, stay tuned.