A couple of weeks ago we noticed that our sprinkler system main pipe had a leak. Right under the middle of our eight-foot-wide cement walkway. Ugh.

Fixing it boiled down to two choices: either rip up the 5-inch-thick cement to get at the hole in the pipe, or dig out on both sides of the cement and pull out the pipe to fix it. We opted for the latter.

A lot of our collective energy went into that project this weekend, and our lawn will thank us, that's for sure, even though we have not yet succeeded completely. And aren't quite sure what to do next.

We replaced the steel pipe under the sidewalk with a PVC one, but we have not been able to sufficiently seal the joints to prevent serious leakage. It's good enough to run the sprinklers for the moment so that our lawn does not expire for lack of water, but now we're kind of stuck.

The problem is joining the PVC to the metal, which is heavily corroded on one end. We have tried metal-like putty, four encasements of resin-bandages, and some anti-leak stretch tape. This hack is holding its own, but still leaking in steady drips, and might burst if we leave the pressure on when the sprinklers go off.

Next up, we've decided, is to check into trying to rethread the corroded pipe past the point where we cut it off. This means a waste of everything to-date and I have little hope this will work, but we'll see.

In the meantime we have two holes in our yard, a big pile of dirt on the walkway, and have to run the sprinkers by hand under supervision.