I've been finding recently that the best way to fix things is to simply take them apart.  I'm not sure why this works, but it's worked twice in the past month or so. 

Our washing machine wasn't draining completely, so I *tried* to take it apart.  I took out some screws and figured out how the thing worked (a general idea).  I wasn't really sure how to fix it, so I put it back together.  And tada!  It worked great after that.  I think it was just the treat of being taken apart that caused it to fix itself.  It later broke and is unfixable, but that's beside the point. 

One of our toilets sounded like it was "running" recently.  So I took the lid off the back part and played around with a few things.  I didn't find anything that was broken, so I put it back together so that it would at least flush properly.  That's when the "running" sound stopped.  I am by no means a plumber, and I didn't actually fix anything.  Once again, I think it was just the threat of being taken apart that caused the toilet to fix itself. #psychology