Cleaning out the pipes

A guy had a plumbing problem and called the local Rooter guy.   The man walked into the basement, tapped on a few pipes, twisted a joint with a wrench, and the water began to flow. The plumber gave the customer a bill for 100 bucks, and the citizen was outraged. “How can you charge so much?”  The plumber  wrote out an itemized bill:

 

“Tapping the pipe…1.00

Twisting the joint…4.00

Knowing where to twist and tap…95.00”

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I used to teach a “writer’s toolbox” class at UCLA, and at some point in...