This morning, when I stepped outside to spread salt on my ice-laden sidewalk, I discovered that the pipe to the garden hose had burst. Water was gushing like gangbusters. This explained why our sump pump was working overtime.

So how to shut the water off? I suck at plumbing. The only thing to do was shut off the main water valve (#2 in the image above). As it turns out, the pipe leading to the hose (#1 in the image above) did not have a shut off valve, but would’ve benefitted from one. Thus, a plumber is on his way to the house to install one for $95.00.

Ah, home-ownership…