Okay, enough already. I know the Spanish government has their hands full trying to quell the feelings of unease and independence brewing in Catalonia. However, they really owe it to themselves (and the entire country, really) to focus on a more dire and potentially deadly issue: terrible Spanish plumbing practices.

Obviously, I haven’t had the pleasure of inspecting every installation of Spanish plumbing. However, after living in four houses in this wonderful country, I’m developing an appreciation of the subtleties of ineffective plumbing practices.

Unbeknownst to most people practicing the plumbing trade here, it is not necessary to reinvent the wheel with DIY plumbing in each house. It is also not necessary to add levels of complexity to rival a 1940s World War II submarine. I’m only asking for the basics: hot water for my shower? Yes! Launching torpedo on my neighbor? Umm, not really.

We’ve been trying to sort out the plumbing in our most recent house, and it is just as complicated as the previous ones. Perhaps even more so because the heating system seems to be a bit… unusual (an unholy marriage of forced air and hot water piping).

The first few months (summer months), our natural gas bills were sky high. We couldn’t figure out why and neither could the landlord. Eventually it seemed that some of the submarine style water pipe valves needed to be closed, because we were heating water pipes throughout the house even though the ambient temperature was well over 100°F. Luckily we got that sorted out and now are bill is half of what it was. Unfortunately, half of "super high" is still "super high". And we are due to turn on the house heat soon. But that is a problem for another day.

Right now, Jess and I are playing a game of cat and mouse with some of the DIY timers and homemade wiring in an attempt to get hot water when we really need it (in the mornings and evenings). We are getting closer, but still not there unfortunately. Oh well, at least we have good water pressure (in our first house, the water pressure in our master shower was ... shall we say ... on the "urination" setting).