Drain of Death

In our bathroom we have a drain in the floor. It has a grate and underneath that a pipe covered by some odd covering (see second picture below).  Two pipes flow into the drain, one from the bathtub and one from the sinks in both our bathroom and kitchen, as well as the laundry machine. It occurred to me one day that perhaps the stench of death in our bathroom that was wafting about with increasing frequency was coming from the drain. So I investigated. Little did I know that my harmless inquiry would turn into a morning of DEATH.

As it turns out, the design of our drain is such that there is a constant pool of water around the pipe, and with all the various substances that flow into the drain, one can imagine what might just happen to settle down at the bottom of the pool and die a slow and stinky death. Guys, the smell that greeted me upon disturbing the tranquility of the pool of death was what I imagine would greet one upon opening a crypt. Decay. Rot. Staaaank. My roommates promptly asked me to light a candle to counteract the pungent aroma coming from the bathroom. And let me just tell ya, my gag reflexes work REAL WELL. And so began the journey of cleaning out the drain of death. It involved every cleaning fluid in my possession being poured, sprayed, and dumped into the DofD, and a lot of boiling water poured down it to try to overflow the death pool with fresh clean water and get all the death water out. In the end I managed to clean it out to the extent that I could see to the bottom of the death pool and the sides of the pipes were no longer covered in death slime. Not too shabby, if I do say so myself. But oh man, it was quite an adventure, and I of course made sure to document it along the way... 

This only partially conveys the level of disturbingly disgustingly ickyness that greeted me upon removal of the grate and covering. The "water" was about as thick as it looks, and the sides were coated in months (years?) of slimey buildup

This is the covering that goes over the main pipe (presumably to keep the stench from coming up?) and this is me taking it out of the boiling water I put it in to try to clean off some of the black decay. You can perhaps gather from the water color what it looked like prior to the boilage

The yellow toothbrush is a clean, brand new toothbrush. The red toothbrush is a brand new toothbrush that spent 2.2 minutes cleaning out the sides of the pipes. Sick

The final product- A little bit cleaner on the sides, and clearer water... which of course lasted all of 5 hours until we cleaned dishes and ran the washing machine. Excellent