To Dispose or Not to Dispose

I always thought one of the main purposes of a food disposal was to cut down on one’s garbage. But even as we manage to leave more and more things out of ours, one of the two sink drains in our kitchen got hopelessly stopped up a couple of days ago.

Fortunately it was the smaller “bar” sink drain. The disposal seemed to run just fine, but after about 10 seconds it would regurgitate all the water back up into a sort of waterspout out of the disposal. There were bits of stinky food and lots of water that eventually disappeared leaving a residue of the stinky food. Lovely, yes?

Truthfully we seldom need to use that sink, which is even more perplexing as to why that drain would stop up.

Since we don’t own a snake and wouldn’t know what to do with one if we did, we called a plumber. It was one we had used before who continues to get good ratings on Angie’s List. I recalled that they had been expensive the last time. But Angie’s List seems to rule here, so they came out this morning to unstop our drain. Forty minutes and $200 later it was clear and they were done. That seems like a lot of money for something that didn’t even require any parts.

The real kicker is three more items added to our “do not dispose” list: pasta, egg shells, and coffee grounds. Except for an occasional egg shell, these have never gone down that drain.

So I ask myself just what is left since we no longer dispose of onion peels, potato skins, fruit rinds, and many other things that have been the culprits on other occasions. Why in the world do we even bother with garbage disposals at all?

Maybe I should take a course in plumbing. I could probably go on a nice trip or at least have a few nice dinners out for the money we spend on plumbing in a year...