For those of you who may not remember, we bought an above ground pool last year because...it really did seem like a good idea at the time. However, the idea began to sour almost as soon as we left the store.
Why? http://dpdavidson.blogspot.com/2017/07/the-rain-in-spain.html
That's why.
We made it through the winter with everything intact (or so we thought) but when Spring came we learned the truth and it was ugly. So, so, ugly.
The cover that had come with the pool was, how to put it nicely...worthless, so I ended up using a tarp to cover the pool. It worked pretty well, but then it rained once or twice and then the water froze and melted so then there were puddles and do you know what likes to spawn in puddles? Mosquitoes.
Yeah, so as soon as it was warm enough, we got hustle outside with buckets to remove the nasty water that had collected on top of the tarp, because the water in the pool was pristine, and I did not spend the winter keeping it covered so I could immediately contaminate it with mosquito larvae, doyouhearme!
However, in removing the ocean water upon the tarp, we flooded the back yard which ripped Mr. D's knickers because he had wanted to mow down the forest (a.k.a. backyard) that evening. Maybe it was the sight of a million pre-winged mosquitoes wiggling in the tarp water under my nose, but I felt my issue was a little more pressing than his. I really didn't want to be the family responsible for infesting the entire neighborhood. Maybe I hadn't conveyed that message clearly enough to him. He thought I was just being a brat. That's another story, and I will tell it. It's crazy and it's not his fault.
At any rate, the yard was flooded, but the tarp was off and the pool water was clear and beautiful and even though you could see the schmutz on the bottom, a little bit of chemical intervention, a little suck, suck from the pool vacuum, and running of the filter and we should have been good to go, but NO, it can't ever be that easy.
I plugged in the filter and the clear top cracked. Well, dammit.
You know, I've seen it a lot lately, where the loss of the smallest, seemingly insignificant thing can render the entire entity completely useless. It is astounding how often that happens. For example, the smallest piece broke in the driver's side seat belt of Eenie's car, so her seat belt wouldn't latch. If her seat belt doesn't latch she can't drive her car (as her parents, we won't allow it. Period. The end). Thus her entire car is useless.
Anyway, the top was broken, thereby rendering the entire pool filter useless. Two futile weeks spent in search of a replacement top gave us unfiltered and therefore, green, water and we ended up buying a completely new filter because that one little piece can only be bought from England and is unavailable until August. Remember those mosquitoes? They were about to have a whole lot more breeding ground if we didn't step up our game. Also, you can chemical the ever-loving life out of your pool water, but it still needs a filter because those june bugs can't swim and don't remove themselves.
So Mr. D orders a new filter, but dammit it all if he didn't check to make sure the hoses that came with it fit the pool. Because they didn't, but it wouldn't have mattered if he had because the brand of pool we bought (Bestway - avoid it like the plague) is the ONLY brand that uses the size hose it does. Also, because size wasn't enough of an issue, the new filter's hoses screw on while our old hoses were clamped.
I managed to fit our old hoses onto the new filter (yay!) and we were in business (!) until I went outside the next morning and found that the outgoing hose (old) had sprung a leak. DAMMMIT! Bear in mind, this was in the same four week period that we were planning and executing Eenie's graduation ceremony and party, planning and executing a week long trip across the mid-west, wherein half way through the trip the AC in the van died, Meenie was preparing to take her driver's test, and the car she needed to use was the car that no longer had a functioning driver's side seat belt, and we were also preparing to take Eenie to Utah to spend the Summer with my brother and sister-in-law. So this was the annoyance that just kept on giving.
I couldn't use the hoses that had originally come with the pool. None of them, because the second hose cracked the next day, and every day we can't run the filter is another day the algae gets further ahead of us. I'm racking my brain trying to figure out some way to adapt these stupid friggin hoses for my pool and I think, "I can't be the only person in the world who has this issue!"
Amazon had adapters. I ordered and installed them. I would like very much to say we have won the war and the Davidson's are able to enjoy the pool once more, but that would be a dirty, dirty lie because it is a dirty, dirty pool.
Mr. D thinks we should drain it, but I feel like doing that is a sign of defeat and if we drain it, I just want to get rid of it, but we've come to the place where we've invested too much time, energy and money just to let it go. I hate it when I find myself in that position. It's like the dang garden all over again.
We should just drain it, but I'm no quitter. I will, however, use every curse word I've ever heard while I continue to beat my head against the pool filter of futility.
Stupid pool.
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