Mr. Fix-It

I'd like to officially ask everything in my house to stop breaking. It has gotten so bad this week that as I was leaving the house this morning (after, yes, fixing something) Joy remarked off the cuff, "Aren't you the Mr. Fix-It this week?"

Let's catalog this week's breakage:

1. Evidently, Canon printers have a pesky little design flaw where, after a few years, what they call the "waste ink tank" gets full and your printer flashes at you until you empty it. I checked with Canon and they said that it was a messy job and so I should take it in to get it serviced to the tune of $80 or so. I did a little research (knew my PhD would come in handy some day) and discovered that the waste ink tank is a large felt pad on the bottom of the printer. I unscrewed the printer, took out the felt pad, washed and dried it (and took Clorox to my hands to remove the excess ink on them), and put it all back together. Problem solved. $80 please
2. Our vacuum cleaner hasn't been picking up all the little crumbs of food Sam kindly leaves on the floor for it to eat. The attachments worked fine, so I opened up the vacuum's head and discovered a broken belt. One trip to the appliance store and you can eat off our floors again along with Sam.
3. I was taking a shower yesterday morning when I noticed the water pooling at my feet. Last night I got to stand in cold, 10-hour-old shower water and plunge away at the drain. All sorts of lovely things came up, but the drain is open now.
4. We've had the table pad underneath the tablecloth on our dining room table for a few months, so Joy decided to remove both and move to placemats for a while. But when we pulled off the pad, a chunk of the felt elected to remain with the table. I'm still working on that one, so any hints would be welcome.

As a result of these fixes, Sam has declared that I can fix anything. Last night at supper, the plastic handle of his fork broke. "Fix it, Dada!" he insisted, shoving his greasy fork at me. I dutifully glued it back together. The day before, I was playing trains with him when he chunked Percy across the room. Percy, who is battery powered, split in two. "Fix him, Dada!" Sam cried, and I did, only to put Percy away for a while for throwing. (I'm a cruel Dad, I know) I'm just waiting for the inevitable escalation as our boundary-testing toddler sees just how far my fixing powers will go. "Fix it, Dada!" he'll gleefully shout as he runs through the house frightfully wielding his giant plastic hammer. Perhaps it's time for something to stay broken.