Clog!

In the course of your average day, how many times do you think about the drain in your bathroom sink? Unless you're a professional plumber, that figure would probably be in the once or twice range, depending on how many times you brush or wash or find yourself in the vicinity for any other particular reason. And in those spare moments, the actual pondering of said drain is brief, at best: a second, maybe two. The rest of the day is blessedly free of concerns or care for that drain.
Until it stops working. When the water just sits there in the sink, and there is no satisfying rush of water down the pipes. Just a pool of water that mocks your intention to go about the rest of your day. "Deal with me," it cries in a display of passive aggression that stands as a hallmark to all others. This is a problem. What will happen if more water goes in that sink? Where will it go? This is not the way things are supposed to work.
So you stop what you were doing and start poking, prodding, plunging and cursing. All the other drains in the house are doing their job quite nicely. Why can't this one simply behave? Is it because I have neglected you for so long that you feel the need to take it out on me now, of all times, now? Couldn't you have waited for a better, more convenient time, like when we were ready to sell the house?
Alas, no amount of pleading does the job that gravity and a certain amount of chemical inducement will. When it's all over, the muck has to be wiped from all the previously muck-free surfaces and all those surprised that came from the cabinet beneath the sink have to somehow fit back inside. And I am reminded once again of the way life gives us metaphors. Thanks, life.