Leaky Logic
This was it! The great day had finally arrived! Cincinnati was going to be the first city in the world to switch to the brand new Munzbacher Pipeless Plumbing system, starting with the 133-year-old City Hall building.
For weeks, City Hall was overrun by plumbers breaking walls open, digging up floor boards, and removing every pipe they could find. It was a lot of work to convert such a massive building to pipeless plumbing, especially one which had been using traditional pipes for so many years.
Anshel Holtzbacher and Joel E. Munz had personally come to Cincinnati to oversee the project, managed by Mo Munchy and Sticky Stu, the most efficient factory workers from the Jolly Munz Candy Factory. Everyone was hard at work, removing old infrastructure and installing the new equipment. Aquatransmitters and hydroreceivers had to be positioned perfectly so that water could be sent across the building pipelessly. Vortex-link encoders and mist-modulators were installed inside the walls where the pipes had been. Finally, the work was complete. Systems in place, walls patched up, ceilings repainted, and furniture back where it belonged. Cincinnati City Hall was ready to go pipeless.
A large pipe-cutting ceremony was held in front of the historic building. Cincinnati mayor Abfat Vapurel stood on the sidewalk at a large podium erected for the occasion. Anshel Holtzbacher and Joel E. Munz stood by his side as a crowd gathered across the street.
“Today is a great day for our city,” the mayor said loudly. “Thanks to Mister uh… Ashnel er… Hoz..hol..hoblatzker and Mister Joel Munz, Cincinnati is proud to be the first city in the world to move past the old-fashioned idea of pipes. For too long, people have suffered from leaky pipes in the summer and burst pipes in the winter. From this day on, all of this is behind us. I pronounce this day ‘CinciWATER Day’!”
Mayor Vapurel picked up the ceremonial pipe with one hand and a hacksaw in the other and proceeded to saw through the lead tube. Fifteen minutes later, the mayor triumphantly finished cutting the pipe in half and announced “I hereby pronounce the city of Cincinnati to be pipe free! Happy Cinciwater Day!”
With that, the mayor turned the giant valve to send thousands of gallons of fresh water flowing pipelessly into City Hall. Everyone clapped and cheered.
BOOM!
Everyone jumped.
SPLOOOOOSH!!!!
Mayor Vapurel looked up in horror as torrents of water began pouring out of the main entrance to City Hall. Seconds later, windows began to burst as water started coming out of every single opening in the building.
“Everyone, panic! Run for your lives!” he screamed, pushing a worker out of his way to avoid getting water on his $10,000 suit.
Anshel Holtzbacher and Joel E. Munz quickly hurried and turned off the giant valve and the water slowed to a trickle.
“What happened?” asked Anshel.
“I don’t know,” said Joel. “Mo! Come here!” he said, turning to Mo Munchy.
“Mo,” said Joel. “Did you install the Aquatransmitters?”
Mo nodded.
“And the hydroreceivers? Vortex-link encoders? Mist-modulators?”
“Yup, yup, yup,” Mo said.
“What about the linear drip duplexer?”
“Oh, yeah we couldn’t figure out which way the wires were supposed to go. And besides, none of us knew what it was supposed to do anyway, so it couldn’t be that important.”
Mr. Munz put his head in his hands. “Oy, what did you do, Mo? Don’t you realize duplex isolation is needed to cleanly separate the outgoing high pressure stream from the weaker return flow? Why do you think I told you to install it? Without that, the system gets overloaded and shoots water everywhere! Barook Hashem we have insurance!”
As a municipal tactical mop squad arrived to start drying everything off, Joel E. Munz turned to Anshel Holtzbacher.
“Anshel,” he said. “I just realized something. You know, as I learn more about how to do mitzvos and keep aveiros, I often wonder why certain mitzvos exist. Like eating gefilte fish with a carrot on Shabbos night. I don’t really like carrots so I never do that mitzvah. But now I realize, if Hashem wants me to eat a carrot, I should still do it even if I don’t want to, because He knows why it’s important, even if I don’t. From now on, I will eat my carrots!”
“That’s beautiful, Joel,” Anshel said, moving out of the way for a team of men wearing combat plumbing gear, carrying military grade plungers. “That’s the right attitude to have. But it’s not a mitzvah to eat a carrot with your gefilte fish if you don’t like it. On Shabbos it’s a mitzvah to eat things you do enjoy. But any time you want to understand a mitzvah better, I am always happy to learn with you.”
Have a Wonderful Shabbos!
Let’s review:
- What happens when you forget to install a linear drip duplexer?
- Why do we do mitzvos even if we do not understand the reason?
