An Unexpected Find

My first visit to Home Depot over the weekend didn’t get all the materials I was after, but it did reveal something I’d been looking for without success: new drain extenders.

The current ones date back to 1987/88 when the carport was built and the mother had enough of the wrought iron out front and replaced it with the columns. (I wish I’d been smart enough to take pictures back then.) So you can imagine that they aren’t in great shape. They’ve seen a few too many violent storms and more than their share of snow and ice.

The hardware stores haven’t had these for years. I know, because I’ve looked. Sometime in the last several months, I found some online but then winter came and all other kinds of issues with it and I forgot about them. They were around $8 apiece.

The ones at Home Depot were under $6.50! Luckily, I did some wandering while looking for my PVC boards for the shed and there they were among the drains and downspouts. They hadn’t been there before when I was actively looking for them. And, store associate after store associate would tell me there was no such thing. Uh-huh.

I don’t have them all on yet (the mother insists that the drains be cleaned first), but I wanted to see if the plastic mounting bracket was going to slide easily over the drain. You know, like it shows on the label. If your experience is anything like mine, things rarely go like they do on the package.

But it did.

A sheet metal screw in each side and it’s firmly in place. And it also lets you flip up the drain to get it out of your way. Perfection.