But the problem is I don't know if I did it right. See, as I drained the water, I didn't see any dirty water. I was initially putting this supposedly bad water in buckets to note how dirty it was, but the first few bucketfuls were completely clear. That's when I decided to take out a garden hose from the shed, attach it to the short leader hose I also found in the shed, connect them (with a bit of difficulty; I sprayed some water all over the floor, dammit), and laid the other end in the floor drain in the laundry room.
I think I waited half an hour before it appeared as though the water from the hose slowed to a trickle. I also checked where the garden hose connected to the leader hose, which I put in a bucket to collect the water coming out of the poor connection. That seemed to also slow to a trickle, and that Internet tells me that means the water heater is completely empty. So, I began flushing it by opening up the water valve for between five and 20 seconds and then shutting it off. That start and stop is supposed to rustle up any sediment that settled in the bottom of the tank of the water heater so it could be sucked out of the drain plug.
At first, the water was dirty -- well, not brown like I was afraid it would be, but not as clear as the water that was taken out of the heater. So I dumped the first bucket in the front yard while I took out a second bucket in which to continue to drain the tank. Once in a while I would open and shut the water valve. And the water continued to be dirty. What it didn't appear to do, I'm afraid, is get better. I kept dumping out bucket after bucket for, I believe, 45 minutes. And while I could trick myself into thinking it was getting clearer, it was not getting clear.
I didn't know what to do. I Googled and the damn AI said that this flushing method should take no more than 15 minutes. Then why in the hell was I still getting brown-ish water after flushing for damn near 45 minutes? Could it be the buckets I'm using making it look not clear? They buckets aren't clear. They're white; maybe that's the issue?
I stopped at a quarter to 11, about 2 1/2 hours after I started this ordeal. Not because I was done, but because I indeed did not know what to do. I closed the drain plug and opened up the water valve all the way. After dumping the last bucket and wrapping up the garden hose I used, I saw that all the faucets I left open while doing this gravity drain was gushing out water and not air. I didn't think that took a long time, however, so I kind of wonder whether I emptied the whole tank after all.
Oh, well. It's all over. Maybe I don't have to do this maintenance every year like I thought I needed to. Me spilling water everywhere, because of the bad connection of the hoses and because of spilling hoses and the filled buckets on the floor, is something I don't want to revisit. But I have just extended the life of the water heater -- maybe?
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