Fixing a Slow Shower Drain

After two and a half glorious weeks in Greece with family, it's back to reality for me! And despite still feeling the effects of jet-lag, I have lots of projects I'm excited to get working on. Maybe it's something about the weather... We've had a little sneak-peek of fall weather this week, and something about that puts me into "nesting" mode. I just want to clean things out, organize, redo. I'm on a roll!

Anyway... fixing the shower was not really on my list, haha! It's been draining slowly for a while now, but not slowly enough to really register on my home improvement radar. After all, fixing a shower drain is kind of yucky. I didn't really want to do it. But then, after using a properly-draining shower on our vacation and then coming home to ours... well, it was time.

I will spare you all and not share a ton of pictures. Because, well, it's gross! But I started out by getting my handy screwdriver and removing the drain cover...

Then I used a very high-tech tool to fish out the hair and gunk that I could get to: a bent wire coat hanger. I told you it was high-tech. On a side note: I had to look all through the closets to find this! It's hard when you don't have clothing that requires dry cleaning, haha!

At that point, I also went and found my rubber gloves because it was icky. I am not the most squeamish person in the world, but it was still gross. I pulled a bunch of junk out of there and threw it away. Then I ran the water, optimistic that I had Solved the Problem!

Except, I hadn't. siiiiigh...

The drain was still as slow as ever. And I couldn't go any farther than I already had with my coat hanger contraption. That's when I busted out the big guns. I ran the water for a minute, allowing water to cover the drain. Then I used our plunger and went to town. And suddenly, BAM! Things started moving! I lifted up the plunger and watched the water swirl quickly down the drain. SUCCESS!!!!!

While we're on the topic of plungers, I think that everyone should own a slightly-more-expensive accordion-type one, as opposed to the traditional cup variety. Seriously. It is the King of Plungers! But really, I am going to stop talking about plungers now. Because they are gross.

Anyway, that was it! I screwed the drain cover back on, gave the entire tub a good scrub down (since I was there, and it needed it), and voila! Done! Hallelujah!!