My bathtub is vomiting.

It’s vomiting on a regular schedule, which I suppose is something. Random vomiting would be worse, if such a thing could be worse.

Apparently it’s my hair. I have long blonde hair. (Save your jokes. I’ve heard them, and mine are better.) And I shed like a Persian with mange.

I’ve also lived in my apartment for three years, which is apparently the time limit on shedding in your shower before things start to go terribly wrong. Notice I said “shower” not “bathtub.” My husband says the two are connected at some point and empty into the same central line. I’m imaging a Y-looking system, but honestly the only pipe I’m familiar with belongs to Sherlock Holmes. So who the heck knows?

My three-year-old hairball is, my groom claims, at the Y junction, so when we shower, the water can’t drain fast enough, backs up and vomits up the other stem of the Y and into my bathtub. And let me tell ya, bathtub vomit? Not pretty.

At first, it was just water. Then, man, I don’t know what that bathtub ate, but woo-wee. Nast-ay. Plain water became water with some gray floaties in it, kinda like the stuff that collects in your dryer vent. Then gray floaties became red ickies, and not red floaty ickies either. Red ickies in solution. Dark red. Frankly, it looks like I slaughtered a pig in my bathtub, and when taken in combination with all the gunshot wound/blood splatter/homicide investigation books a mystery author is likely to have lying around, let’s just say I won’t be inviting any of my detective buddies over for tea anytime soon.

In the meantime, I cleaned my local grocery store out of Draino, and I’m taking suggestions.