How Many Invalids Does It Take to Change a POOLIO Nub

When Hick left on his vacation out west, he was depending on The Pony to take care of Poolio while he was gone. 

"Look at the water. See that little ripple? As long as it's doing that, it's fine. Otherwise, you need to backflush and clean out the filter every couple of days. Come down here and I'll show you how."

"I know how. You've had me do that before. I know what to put it on, and how to clean out that filter."

"Okay. Don't forget."

Well. The Pony didn't forget. But two days later, he was unable to hobble around to Poolio on crutches to do this duty. Guess who's responsible now...

I looked out at Poolio on Friday, and the sight chilled me to the bone. Dead water! Like being becalmed in the Horse Latitudes. No movement. No ripple. Water surface as smooth as glass. I guess the pump wasn't running right, or something was clogging the filter. I'm not a pool boy!

"Pony. Tomorrow I have to do something with Poolio. I sent Dad a text. He said if you couldn't explain it to me, to just turn off the pump until he gets back. I guess you'll have to sit in the door of the laundry room, and talk me through it."

"Yeah. I don't think I can get over that threshold."

Of course I was doing a load of laundry, so The Pony turned off the dryer so he could hear me from down below the back porch. Unfortunately, I couldn't hear him at all. It was like when Yaphet Kotto was being lectured by Sigourney Weaver in the original ALIEN, and he kept opening a valve and letting steam whoosh out just to annoy her and make her yell louder. Only I wasn't being passive-aggressive with The Pony. I had an air conditioner in my ear. 

"You might have to go turn off the air conditioner until we can get this done. I can't hear a word you're saying!"

"Can you hear me now?"

Barely. The Pony had somehow gotten the student desk chair that he's using as a wheely chair up over the doorjamb, and was sitting above me on the back porch. I still could only make out about 1 in 3 words. AND The Pony had the gall to say that he couldn't talk louder because it hurt his throat! I guess the neck bone's connected to the ankle bone.

Anyhoo... when I'd walked out the basement door to get a look at the set-up, this is what I saw:

 

There's a part of the air conditioner unit on the left, that was WHOOSHING in my ear. And that bubble thing that reminded me of a Weber Grill. Mmm...BBQ! A little shift of perspective to the right, and I had a post holding up the pool deck to grasp onto:

 

Sure, that's an easy little step for young whippersnappers to hop around on. But not for Val, whose knee-joint-bone configuration feels like two glass toothpicks on either side of an old fragile Christmas tree bulb. So may dangly things in which to get caught, too. As you might have surmised after all these years: technology is not Val's friend.

I assumed I would be moving that lever thingy. I think that's what The Pony was mush-mouthing from above. Here's a look at the settings:

 

The Pony kept kind-of telling me to put it in BACKFLUSH. Which it was already in! Only I think they called it BACKWASH on the label. You can't read it here, but it's under that lever. I pushed down on the lever, trying to figure out what I was supposed to do. A spurt of water drenched the bottom half of my shirt. I don't even know where it came from! 

 

Maybe it wasn't all the way in the notch. The Pony was not much help. He could hear me, but I couldn't hear him. He refused to go turn off the air conditioner.

"No matter what I do, it won't turn!"

"Are you pushing down on it?"

"YES! So hard that it looks like the whole top might pop off!"

"I think it did once, and water shot out the top, but somehow Dad fixed it again."

"I can't fix it if that happens! No matter how hard I push, that little nub won't go high enough to slide around to a different notch. It did ONCE, and then I put it back like it was. Now it won't move either direction!"

I spent about 30 minutes trying to figure that out, and move the lever. I was trying to find a place that said OFF. Just turn it OFF, like Hick had said.

"It would be great if there was an OFF switch! Or even a breaker!"

"No, there's no breaker for Poolio. And I think Dad might have just run it in conduit, so you won't find a plug-in."

Part of this was discussed when I came back in, and could hear The Pony. I was in tears by that point. I didn't ask to be Poolio-master. Hick should have made better plans before he left! I sent him a text, but the last one I had from him said he was headed out to the pool at his brother's place. That's probably some kind of irony, but I wasn't in a mood to sort it out, freezing in my wet shirt in the air conditioning of my lair.

I sent him a text anyway, and Hick called me the next morning. That's tomorrow's story...

If you're a mechanical wizard and know exactly what my problem was, I am not really in a mood to hear that now! So hold that advice until you find out what HICK told me.