Life without a kitchen sink

Okay, so we do still have our kitchen sink, but we're not allowed to use it until tomorrow evening. Here's the story: For weeks, I've been noticing our kitchen sinks draining more and more slowly. This made washing dishes difficult - we could only wash so many before the sinks would be full of several inches of gross water. When the sinks filled, gunk would rise up out of the drains and then that gunk would stay in the sink after the water (slowly) drained away. It's been a big inconvenience. I eventually pulled out some bins and have been using them to wash the dishes. Even so, it's still inconvenient - when it's time to drain the bins, I have to carry them to the bathroom and pour the soapy water into the toilet, because it just won't drain if I pour it into the sink!

I did try to clear the sinks by pouring in baking soda and vinegar. It made some fun fizzies, but the drains worked just as slowly as ever when I was done with that.

So we finally broke down and turned in a maintenance request (while we were at it, we also requested that they fix the pantry door, which is still leaning against a wall in my room). Today the manager came and looked at the track for the door. He said he'll come back tomorrow to fix it - he needed to get some equipment, probably a replacement track or something. In the meantime, he treated our sink drains with some sort of goo that will (hopefully) make them drain properly. But it needs to set for 24 hours - so we can't get any water in the sink until tomorrow evening.

It's been interesting tonight. When I rinsed off the potatoes for dinner, I had to do it in the bathroom sink. I filled the bins for tonight's dishes in the bathroom sink as well, and had to rig up the dish drainer to drain into the wash water instead of the sink itself. Plus I had to be extra careful while washing and rinsing, so that I wouldn't splash or drip any water out of the bins and into the sink.

I am proud of myself, though, that I did the dishes anyway. Sometimes I look for any excuse to not do any dishes at all - this would have fit perfectly with that mindset. But this time I was determined that the dishes would get done. I want to have clean dishes for tomorrow, and by golly - I'll have them!