Go to Home Depot and Act Like a Woman

Today is day eight as a homeowner.

I've been wrestling with the washing machine since day 2. My brother told me to go to Home Depot and act like a woman, but I didn't. Now I've been to Home depot twice and the Heavener hardware with the nice old men. I thought I'd attained nirvana when I finally got the discharge hose somewhat permanently in the sideways drain, and I did a big, hot, bleachy load of whites...all over the laundry room floor. It is clean now, the floor that is. I lost a lot of the skin off my knuckles to this washing machine.

I called my brother before I even pulled the whole mess away from the wall. I was afraid I'd electrocute myself standing in the bleach pool of a laundry room. Who invents a laundry room without a drain? This brother of mine preached to me his three commandments of plumbing, and this is about as religious as he gets. One. The cold is on the right. Two. The hot is on the left. Three. Shit flows downhill.

That really didn't help. I was wondering why every drop of water I put in the washer poured out onto the floor. When I heaved the discharge hose and the bits of my knuckle into the drain, I pulled the hose off of the washing machine at the bottom.