Al Sicherman: Uncle Al finds Internet search a draining task

New York Times columnist Tom Friedman likes to say that columnists do either heating or lighting: "You can heat things up or you can shed some light." Uncle Al often writes a third kind of column: plumbing.

Some time ago he fussed endlessly under his downstairs bathroom sink, trying to snake out a slow-running drain. When he seemed to have succeeded, and went to put the pipes under the sink back together, he couldn't get them to fit. He ended up buying many pieces of plastic pipe before he managed to get it reassembled.

You were spared most of that story. You're welcome.

Naturally he found that his effort had moved the condition of the drain from slow-running to very slow-running. But he doesn't use that sink much, and he was tired of it and he figured he'd let it alone for a while; it couldn't get much worse. He was, of course, incorrect.

Now the drain is fully stopped up, and there's a pool of water in the sink. Liberal use of a "plumber's friend" has succeeded in sucking up some junk into the standing water.

Yes, Uncle Al could call a plumber. He has done so when there have been major stoppages in the sewer line from his basement to the street. But the bathtub right next to this sink drains fine, so there's just a few feet of sink-only pipe involved; it is this kind of challenge that Uncle Al finds difficult to resist.

But recalling what a pain it was to reassemble the pipes under the sink last time, it is a challenge he has found equally difficult to take up again.

Then last week he received a mailing from Publisher's Clearing House, offering many domestic blandishments, including something called the Drain Buster, which uses a small pump to produce compressed air to blast clogs away without disassembling the plumbing!

Drains are busting out all over

Uncle Al was intrigued, although he couldn't help thinking the name was unfortunate, because it seemed possible that an injudiciously heavy blast of compressed air might indeed bust the drain. (Why not Clog Buster, for example?)

Uncle Al found himself tempted. But the price was $15 plus shipping (which would be $5.99). He thought he'd see if it was cheaper elsewhere.

An Internet search for "drain buster" turned up countless offers from online merchants, each of which seemed to have a different combination of price and shipping charge.

In most cases, it was impossible to see the shipping charge without filling in most of the &$%# order form, so Uncle Al entertained himself by filling in amusing names. Make that barely amusing; it was early in the morning.

Anyway, he spent most of the morning comparing Drain Buster deals. He found prices from $8.68 to $19.95, plus shipping and handling charges that went from $3.50 to $9.85. The worst deal seemed to be $19.95 plus $5.99, total $25.94.

Uncle Al knows this wasn't a good use of his time. In fact, Uncle Al knows it was an incredibly stupid use of his time. Eventually he found an offer for $8.68 plus $6.95 shipping, total $15.63. That was almost three hours after he started, and one of the first offers he had found was $14.95 plus $3.50, total $18.45. So he saved $2.82; that's 94 cents an hour.

That is not to say that Uncle Al got nothing else out of spending a morning chasing the bright, elusive butterfly of Drain Buster. This, for example:

The Drain Buster might or might not have been advertised on TV; it is certainly of a kind with miraculous products that have been, and the names of many of the Web sites offering Drain Buster reflected that. Uncle Al would never have guessed there were so many versions of "As seen on TV": asontv.com; asseenontv.com; asseenontvdiscounts.com; AsseenonTVproducts.biz; as-seen-on-tv-2-go.com; as-seen-on-tv-products.ws; as-seen-on-tv.digbargains.com; allfromtv.com; ontvdeals .com; ontvdeals.net; ProductsonTVdirect.com; seenontvonline.com; seenontvwebstore.com; tvdeals.net; tvtimedirect.com . . .

Plus many, many, many more that don't mention TV. (FYI, Uncle Al checked: The domain .ws, as in as-seen-on-tv-products.ws, stands for Western Samoa. Happy to help.)

Who you gonna call?

And yes, Uncle Al knows: There's an As Seen on TV store at Hugedale. But when he began looking on the Web early in the morning, Mall of America stores hadn't yet opened. Eventually he called: Amazingly, they don't have Drain Busters.

When he was beginning to think he had about tapped out the Internet's possibilities for the cheapest deal (although thousands of search responses were still unexamined), he had a thought: Why not check one of those commercial shopping sites that are supposed to return the names of several merchants for price-comparison information? If nothing else, he could see how the responses differed from just looking for "drain buster" everywhere.

The first five suggestions included two to see "Discount Drain Busters/ New and used selection" on eBay. A used Drain Buster? Uncle Al, who never says "eeew," has to say "Eeew!" The rest of the top five were: "Drain Buster/Will get the tough jobs done;"Drain Buster/Cleaners & Stain Removers Home," and the very best, the kind of thing that could have come from nowhere but the endlessly X-rated Web: "Sexy Drain Singles/View photos, personals and hot profiles of local singles."

Moved by sudden inspiration (and a desire to stop picturing "sexy drain singles"), he called his local hardware store to see if they had Drain Busters. They didn't; they had a gadget powered by hooking it up to a garden hose. That might work fine, but Uncle Al couldn't help picturing a ruptured hose or a broken drainpipe and water, water everywhere. He did learn that this gizmo claimed the name "Clog Buster."

Anyway, Uncle Al has ordered the $8.68-plus-$6.95 Drain Buster. He'll let you know how it goes. That's not hilarious, but what do you expect for $15.63?

Al Sicherman is at

asicherman@startribune.com.