Valkyre

The Pool God Hates Me

I don't want to start any blasphemous rumours
but I think that God's got a sick sense of humour,
and when I die, I expect to find Him laughing.

The lyrics to this Depeche Mode song has been running through my head lately. I do feel there is a God of Pools and he, or she, is laughing their ass off at me right now. After working on the pool for several weeks, with the pump running constantly, we finally get it crystal clear. Absolutely beautiful. So, the weather turns to crap. Those record breaking heat waves turn into June Gloom. Which means grey skies all day, then finally the sun breaks out in the late afternoon. So, it's really too chilly to go swimming. But then, the weather started to warm up and it looked promising for swimming. Except, when I walked out one night, I noticed a somewhat pretty swirl pattern on the bottom of the pool. What? Closer inspection revealed that it was sand. Sand from the sand filter. A lot of it. The sand filter is barely one year old. Reading up on the internet, I find that sand in the pool means that most likely, the laterals at the bottom of the sand filter have probably cracked and that the sand can get through. However, I suspect something else. I do know that if water stops running into the filter, and it starts sucking air, it will spit out sand. I had left the pool running for several hours unsupervised. The water level was dangerously low. Barely above the low line on the water level indicator. The little brat next door likes to throw his toys over the fence. I found a toy wedged in the skimmer part of the filter. Here's what I think happened. I think he tossed the toy into the pool and it managed to get stuck inside the skimmer. At that point, it jammed the little door flap into a slightly closed position which didn't allow any water to get through. Which means the pump started sucking air. For how long? I have no idea. Long enough for it to start spitting out sand. I've vacuumed some of it up and noticed that there was some grit coming out of the outlet into the pool. Not sand, but really fine grit. Eventually, that stopped coming out. So, I am going to vacuum up the rest, back into the filter and check to make sure that it doesn't go back through and back into the pool. Oh, and I'm not giving the suspect toy back. I don't want it back into our pool. We may have to look into raising the fence by that part of the pool. I've had the pump off since last Sunday. I look out this morning and am starting to see a greenish tint in the water. So, I am going to start the routine again, with the sand in the bottom, until I get time to take care of it. So, the crystal clear pool has given away to a faint green cloudiness. It's always something.