Pile of Crap

I was over my friend Andrea's house on Sunday. We got together for a little beer and pizza during the Friends marathon - the last 12 episodes in a row! My first complaint is that Andrea didn't wear a bra. Ok, not really, but I know she'll love seeing her boobs in print. Well, not her boobs, but mention of them. Usually they are nothing to talk about.... hehe

Anywhoooo, I digress. So we were sitting there, drinking and watching Friends, and of course lots and lots of commercials. These commercials repeated themselves over and over throughout the four hours we sat there. There was this stupid one for K of C chicken where some dude was being abducted by some 'bad guys' and they stuck his feet in a bucket of cement, apparently to keep him from talking about how good the chicken was at K of C. It was stupid and in very poor taste, if you ask me.

Now to the reason for my post - there was one particular stinky commercial for RidX - some junk you put in your septic tank to eat the crap. Basically, the commercial was saying use RidX and don't think about your septic tank or else your yard will be a big mushy stinky pile of crap.

Never having had a septic system, I began to wonder how they worked. Andrea, in her infinite wisdom, said that you had to have the tanks pumped out every 10 years or so to get the crap out. I was like, "Whoa! 10 years of crap?!?" I mean, c'mon, it just sits there for 10 years?? So I decided to investigate the situation and report back to Andrea.

She is apparently not too busy at work because she keeps bugging me for the Crap Report. Or the Septi-Blog. Or maybe the Shit-Journal. Whatever. Here it is.

In polite societies, people don't call it sewage, it is called wastewater. Of course, Andrea and I just called it crap. There appears to be three main reasons why 'wastewater' (or the stuff we flush down our toilets) needs to be treated and not just dumped into the ground:

1. It stinks (duh)

2. Bacteria - Human crap (waste) contains E-coli and other bacteria that can cause disease. Don't want to cause a health hazard...

3. It has suspended solids and chemicals that affect the environment: Wastewater has
a. nitrogen and phosphates that encourage the growth of algae. This excessive algae growth can block the sunlight and foul the water.
b. organic materials that bacteria in the environment will start decomposing (crap). When this happens the bacteria consumes oxygen from the water. The lack of oxygen that results will kill fish.
c. floating crap (suspended solids) makes water look murky and can affect the ability of fish to breathe and see.

No one wants to live in a place that stinks, is full of deadly bacteria and cannot support life. Icky!

Now that we know WHY we need a septic or sewer system, lets get back to the 'how does it work' regarding the tank-o-crap. Basically, the septic tank is just a huge concrete or steel tank buried in your yard. It can hold up to 1,000 gallons of water. The wastewater (from toilet, sink, tub/shower, etc) flows into the tank at one end and heads out at the other.

The heavy stuff settles to the bottom (the sludge layer), the floaters will rise to the top (the scum layer) and everything else is sort of suspended in the middle. This middle layer is kinda clear but has all kinds of bacteria and chemicals. The bacteria will break down the organic stuff (crap) and cause gas. Now, you may be surprised to hear this; but, the gas does not smell good.

Now when some new water comes into the septic tank, it pushes out some of the old water. This old water goes into the ground into something called a drain field. This drain field is made of perforated pipes buried in trenches filled with gravel. The plan is that the water is slowly absorbed and filtered by the ground.

So that is pretty much how they work. What did I learn? That if a septic system is put in correctly, they should pretty much be self functioning and in no need of maintenance. If you are foolish, however, and flush your tampons and stuff, they you may be in trouble. Get some RidX!!

I feel so enlightened and must thank my friend Andrea for making me do this research.

Next Blog: What happens when your crap backs up?

xoxo