Imagine you are…

..a rain gutter downspout. No, really.

Like all downspouts, you are a complete bastard.

Despite or perhaps because of the fact that your job is intermittent and unchallenging – (all you do is route water from the roof of the house down to the ground) you have lots of time to focus on your bastard-ness.

Okay, focus– you’re a downspout. You can fail at any time. You learn that your owners are selling the house.

Do you fail:

• Immediately?
  No. This would be tipping your hand too soon. Your owners would simply fix before the house ever hit the market.
• When there's buttloads of rain pouring down for a week?
  Oh, please. Show some imagination. This is a given.
  
• after the house is for sale?
  No. Again, far too soon.
• After the house has an accepted offer?
  Better, but remember – you’re a downspout. You have to raise the bar of bastardry.
• One day before the house inspection (that the sale is contingent upon)?
  Yes! (and well played, my good and faithful bastard) You can move to the front of the class.

If you said you would also get your fellow downspouts to fail with you, you've just won our grand prize.

Because our two front downspouts have tag teamed us. One separated at the joint, so that the water left the elbow going straight down (next to our foundation for easy access).

But that one was merely the copycat.

The instigator and world champeen was the downspout where the last angle was buried under our flowerbed. As you can imagine, this is a bad idea. In order to bury the downspout, the angle had to be flattened so the entire length could be hidden under dirt.

Memo to the idiots who installed this: near-level downspouts clog easily.

I'll shorthand the water in the basement story, but in trying to chase down the root of the problem I found the copycat first and fixed him easily.

But the instigator had to get fixed this morning. The exit was half buried in mud, which meant the water routed around the side of the house. Initially, I thought this was the only problem. Since it was buried I opted to cut the vertical shaft a few feet above the ground. Not having a suitable saw, I opted for a pair of very strong shears.

I made one snip on the corner to get started - and was immediately hit full-on in the face by a jet of water.

I'm like: WTH? It's raining, but no way that...

And then I realize, the bottom is clogged. the entire downspout is full of water- and my first cut is spraying water like a fire hose.

So, I'm already wet - I keep hacking and get four more good cuts on the spout. Each one gushes even more water, and I'm absolutely soaked. It takes a good half a minute for the spout to drain.

After that, fixing it is snack food. Attach elbow, attach new length of ABOVE-ground downspout, and put a landing ramp for the last drop to the lawn.

It's of course, still raining - so I get to see the immediate result is that the water that was turning the raised flowerbed into a bog is now peacefully splashing out onto the front slope of our front yard.

Take that, you bastard.