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In a typical home, more than 9,000 gallons of water are wasted while running the faucet waiting for hot water. 

As much as 15% of your annual water heating costs can be wasted heating this extra 9,000 gallons. (Ask us about the solution)

Though we all have heardthe many slang-words of which his cognomen is probably responsible for, the truth is... there is no hard evidence anywhere that English plumber, Thomas Crapper was the inventor of the modern-day amenity that often bears his less-than-flattering name (it's believed Crapper may have bought the patent rights from another man - Albert Giblin - and marketed the concept as his own).

More toilets flush during half time of the Super Bowl than during any other time of year.

The toilet uses more water than any other appliance in the house. 

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Chicken Tortilla Soup I

By: Star Pooley 

"This soup is quick to make, flavorful, and filling! Serve with warm corn bread or tortillas. This also freezes well. Garnish with chopped fresh avocado, Monterey Jack cheese, crushed tortilla chips, or green onion!"

Prep Time: 20 Min

Cook Time: 20 Min

Ready In: 40 Min

Servings  8 

Ingredients

• 1 onion, chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 2 teaspoons chili powder
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 (28 ounce) can crushed tomatoes
• 1 (10.5 ounce) can condensed chicken broth
• 1 1/4 cups water
• 1 cup whole corn kernels, cooked
• 1 cup white hominy
• 1 (4 ounce) can chopped green chile peppers
• 1 (15 ounce) can black beans, rinsed and drained
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
• 2 boneless chicken breast halves, cooked and cut into bite-sized pieces
• crushed tortilla chips
• sliced avocado
• shredded Monterey Jack cheese
• chopped green onions

Directions

1. In a medium stock pot, heat oil over medium heat. Saute onion and garlic in oil until soft. Stir in chili powder, oregano, tomatoes, broth, and water. Bring to a boil, and simmer for 5 to 10 minutes.
2. Stir in corn, hominy, chiles, beans, cilantro, and chicken. Simmer for 10 minutes.
3. Ladle soup into individual serving bowls, and top with crushed tortilla chips, avocado slices, cheese, and chopped green onion.

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Greetings!    

I hope that you and your family have enjoyed a fantastic summer. Caisie and I just returned from Phoenix, Arizona where we were a part of several business improvement classes. Indeed, we were absolutely blown away with all the new ideas to better serve you, our clients, and we are anxious to implement them.

Of course, there was a little time for site seeing in Phoenix. Caisie and I love to shop thrift stores and are always tickled to see what we may find while traveling in different cities. We were able to make some cool purchases but the most interesting store we visited was "The Ranch Market". Among their incredible and diverse food selections, we saw a complete cow's head right there on display in the meat cooler among the other meats - amazing!

Now as we go into fall's cooler weather, it's time to begin thinking about getting our outdoor faucets winterized again. You will find detailed instructions on how to do just that in this month's Newsletter.

As we continue to support "The Bra Recyclers", we want you to know that October is Bra Recyclers Month. This organization organizes the collection and distribution of quality used bras around the country to support homeless and abused women housed at various shelters. Casey's Plumbing is one of their collection sites and we support and deliver to "Shepherd's Door" a branch of "The Portland Rescue Mission".

Also in this months Newsletter, be sure to check out the Tortila Soup Recipe of the Month. Caisie just prepared it with tacos at our dinner table tonight. I thought it was scrumptious!

Finally, don't overlook our Diamond Club Plus plan in this Newsletter. If you are a home owner and not a current member,  you really should check it out. Here's a few examples of it's incredible value: you receive 20% off most work performed, you receive free annual home checkups to ensure your plumbing and electrical systems are safe and best of all - it's FREE! That's right, every penny of the $14.95 goes into a reserve account for the member to use towards future work. Let's say that you have been a member for 10 months and call in for service. In this case you will have almost $150.00 in reserves that can be spent on any work performed on that call. Not to mention that as a Diamond Club Plus member, you go to the head of the line when you call, regardless of how many non club members were already booked. So check it out. It really is the most generous plan you'll ever see.

Thanks so much for continued patronage,

Standard outside faucets with winterization shut off valves.  

 

 

If you have a garage, there is a good chance that there is an outside hose bibb or hydrant,  attached to it along with a service valve located somewhere in the garage (usually somewhere in close proximity to the water heater - see below). 

TYPICAL BALL AND WASTE SERVICE VALVE

The shut off valve to your garage hydrant is either a ball and waste or another form of valve with a waste cap. Note: The "waste cap" is to allow air into the system so that when you turn off the valve to your hose bibb, air can displace the water. 

Turning the above valve off without opening the "waste cap" will result in a vacuum. As such, water cannot drain even though the water is shut off and the outside hydrant completely open.

Below are a couple of images to illustrate taking off the "waste cap" to prepare the faucet for draining. In theory, you are only required to loosen the "waste cap" to allow air into the system. But as you can see from the below image, there is a small rubber gasket up inside the cap.

Opening the "waste cap", to ensure the drain line is open and can get air to drain properly. Sometimes this gasket will get stuck to the drain on the valve body, thus not allowing air into the system.  That's why I remove the cap completely, allow a little water to drain out (see above) just to make sure the drain is open, and then replace the cap back onto the drain with just a turn or two making sure it is still loose.

And you're still not done yet. The majority of modern outside hydrants also have an Anti Siphon Valve at the tip. Exercising this is the final step to winterize your outside hydrants.

 

 

 

As you can see, the Anti Siphon Valve above has a pin protruding out of the spout. After performing the earlier steps, the last step is to push this pin to the side and hold it until the water is drained. On some vacuum breakers like the one above, will have a ring to pull down or lift up. Use the same instructions for these as well.

Here are all the steps, in order to winterize your outside hydrant...

• Close the service valve (see above).
• Disconnect garden hose from outside faucet and leave it disconnected for the season.
• Open the outside faucet and leave it open.
• Return to service valve and open the "waste cap". After making sure that the gasket is not stuck and blocking the flow, place the cap back on the drain loosely.
• And then finally, return to the outside hydrant and exercise the Anti Siphon Valve (see above). 

Clearly, it's no wonder so many end up with broken pipes even though they thought they prepared properly. Again, the most common mistake made when winterizing the above outside hydrant, is that some or all of the above steps are not performed properly.

Frost Proof Hydrants

If you have a frost proof hydrant, the only thing you need to remember to do is to disconnect the garden hose connected to it. This is because a frost proof hydrant has a long stem that will actually stop the water on the heated side of the house. So when a garden hose is left attached, the faucet barrel cannot drain. 

If you have left the hose connected all winter and are unsure if there is damage, simply turn it on. If it froze up, the barrel is likely cracked and will leak inside the wall, only when the valve is turned on.

              
As you can see, this faucet has a long stem designed to stop the water on the heated side of the room. After turning this valve off, the excess water left in the faucet drains on out of the 6" to 30" barrel. But if you have a garden hose connected, it cannot drain and thus will freeze and break during harsh weather. (SEE BELOW)

When this happens, the faucet will leak everytime you turn it on to use it.

So again, if you have a frost proof faucet REMEMEBER TO DISCONNECT YOUR GARDEN HOSES BEFORE THE FREEZING WEATHER SETS IN.

FOUNDATION VENTS

Another common over sight when preparing for winter weather is leaving the foundation vents unprotected. These vents must be open in the warmer weather to allow your home to breath. 

But during the winter, they must be blocked to prevent arctic winds from freezing your pipes. No matter how well you insulate your pipes, if the arctic winds are allowed to enter the crawl space, they will simply take longer to freeze, but freeze they will!

                              

               

APPLY VENT COVERS FROM THE OUTSIDE  / OR FROM THE INSIDE

Of course, if all this is more than you want to tackle, you can always hire a professional. 

For your plumbing preparations, give us a call! We'll always be there for you.

If you just need a little advice, feel free to call Caisie Breen at 971-563-9418.

  503-620-9111

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MORE THAN JUST A 20% SAVINGS

including 20% off any work performed*.

They also receive special treatment when calling in for a service call; they go to the front of the line regardless of how many non-Diamond Club Plus customers were on the board. 

A Diamond Club Plus member will receive a FREE annual plumbing and electrical evaluation to ensure your system is safe and operating smoothly.  

And finally, it's FREE! The $14.95 monthly dues accumulate in an account to be used for future work. So let's say that you've been a member for 10 months and now need some plumbing or electrical work done. You will now have accumulated around $150.00 that can go towards that work. So there you have it; it really is FREE.

Because we couldn't possibly accommodate all of our clients, we limit the membership to 22% of our customer base. So if you are interested in becoming a member, do so today.  

Just call, 503-620-9111 and tell them you want special treatment too and are ready to sign up for the Diamond Club Plus.

*Does not apply to larger bid type work. 

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Tips for hiring a contractor

MONEY SAVING COUPONS

All Plumbers Are Not The Same  

• All Casey's Plumbing employees are background checked to insure that a safe person is entering your home.

• All employees at Casey's Plumbing are drug tested to insure that an alert professional will be performing your plumbing work.

• We offer a full two year warranty (three years for Diamond Club Plus clients), on all our repair work and a lifetime warranty on all workmanship. That's right - if any work we perform ever fails due to workmanship, we will repair it at no cost to you.  

Sure, there are a number of plumbing contractors out there to chose from and it's always a good idea to get more than one quote when choosing a contractor. 

But I want you to know, that when you need a plumber, we'll be there for you. There will be no price surprises and if you are unhappy at anytime with our service, we'll do the job over for free! 

So who should you choose?  

I am humbled and indeed proud, of the loyal customer base we have grown and believe that if you give us a chance, you'll be a happy loyal client as well.

You'll be happy with our service - I personally guarantee it!

Halloween is a holiday celebrated on the night of October 31. Traditional activities include trick-or-treating, bonfires, costume parties, visiting "haunted houses" and carving jack-o-lanterns.  

Irish and Scottish immigrants carried versions of the tradition to North America in the nineteenth century. Other western countries embraced the holiday in the late twentieth century including Ireland, the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico and the United Kingdom as well as of Australia and New Zealand. 

Halloween has its origins in the ancient Celtic festival known as Samhain.  

Samhain was a time used by the ancient pagans to take stock of supplies and prepare for winter. The ancient Gaels believed that on October 31, the boundaries between the worlds of the living and the dead overlapped and the deceased would come back to life and cause havoc such as sickness or damaged crops.

The festival would frequently involve bonfires. It is believed that the fires attracted insects to the area which attracted bats to the area. These are additional attributes of the history of Halloween.

Masks and consumes were worn in an attempt to mimic the evil spirits or appease them.

Trick-or-treating, is an activity for children on or around Halloween in which they proceed from house to house in costumes, asking for treats such as confectionery with the question, "Trick or treat?" The "trick" part of "trick or treat" is a threat to play a trick on the homeowner or his property if no treat is given. Trick-or-treating is one of the main traditions of Halloween. It has become socially expected that if one lives in a neighborhood with children one should purchase treats in preparation for trick-or-treaters.

The history of Halloween has evolved.  The activity is popular in the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, and due to increased American cultural influence in recent years, imported through exposure to US television and other media, trick-or-treating has started to occur among children in many parts of Europe, and in the Saudi Aramco camps of Dhahran, Akaria compounds and Ras Tanura in Saudi Arabia.  

The most significant growth - and resistance is in the United Kingdom, where the police have threatened to prosecute parents who allow their children to carry out the "trick" element. In continental Europe, where the commerce-driven importation of Halloween is seen with more skepticism, numerous destructive or illegal "tricks" and police warnings have further raised suspicion about this game and Halloween in general.

In Ohio, Iowa, and Massachusetts, the night designated for Trick-or-treating is often referred to as Beggars Night.

Part of the history of Halloween  is Halloween costumes. The practice of dressing up in costumes and begging door to door for treats on holidays goes back to the Middle Ages, and includes Christmas wassailing.  

Trick-or-treating resembles the late medieval practice of "souling," when poor folk would go door to door on Hallowmas (November 1), receiving food in return for prayers for the dead on All Souls Day (November 2). It originated in Ireland and Britain, although similar practices for the souls of the dead were found as far south as Italy. Shakespeare mentions the practice in his comedy The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1593), when Speed accuses his master of "puling [whimpering, whining], like a beggar at Hallowmas." 

Yet there is no evidence that souling was ever practiced in America, and trick-or-treating may have developed in America independent of any Irish or British antecedent.  

There is little primary Halloween history documentation of masking or costuming on Halloween - in Ireland, the UK, or America - before 1900.  

The earliest known reference to ritual begging on Halloween in English speaking North America occurs in 1911, when a newspaper in Kingston, Ontario, near the border of upstate New York, reported that it was normal for the smaller children to go street guising (see below) on Halloween between 6 and 7 p.m., visiting shops and neighbors to be rewarded with nuts and candies for their rhymes and songs.  

Another isolated reference appears, place unknown, in 1915, with a third reference in Chicago in 1920. The thousands of Halloween postcards produced between the turn of the 20th century and the 1920s commonly show children but do not depict trick-or-treating.  

Ruth Edna Kelley, in her 1919 history of the holiday, The Book of Hallowe'en, makes no mention of such a custom in the chapter "Hallowe'en in America." It does not seem to have become a widespread practice until the 1930s, with the earliest known uses in print of the term "trick or treat" appearing in 1934, and the first use in a national publication occurring in 1939. Thus, although a quarter million Scots-Irish immigrated to America between 1717 and 1770, the Irish Potato Famine brought almost a million immigrants in 1845-1849, and British and Irish immigration to America peaked in the 1880s, ritualized begging on Halloween was virtually unknown in America until generations later.

Trick-or-treating spread from the western United States eastward, stalled by sugar rationing that began in April 1942 during World War II and did not end until June 1947.

Early national attention to trick-or-treating was given in October 1947 issues of the children's magazines Jack and Jill and Children's Activities, and by Halloween episodes of the network radio programs The Baby Snooks Show in 1946 and The Jack Benny Show and The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet in 1948.  

The custom had become firmly established in popular culture by 1952, when Walt Disney portrayed it in the cartoon Trick or Treat, Ozzie and Harriet were besieged by trick-or-treaters on an episode of their television show, and UNICEF first conducted a national campaign for children to raise funds for the charity while trick-or-treating.

Trick-or-treating on the prairie. Although some popular histories of Halloween have characterized trick-or-treating as an adult invention to rechannel Halloween activities away from vandalism, nothing in the historical record supports this theory. To the contrary, adults, as reported in newspapers from the mid-1930s to the mid-1950s, typically saw it as a form of extortion, with reactions ranging from bemused indulgence

to anger. Likewise, as portrayed on radio shows, children would have to explain what trick-or-treating was to puzzled adults, and not the other way around. Sometimes even the children protested: for Halloween 1948, members of the Madison Square Boys Club in New York City carried a parade banner that read "American Boys Don't Beg." 

Thanks to halloweenhistory.org for this information 

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