Swamp Creature

There's something nasty in my sink drain, and it looks like something that could be the subject of a horror film. Let me see ... Attack of the Toothpaste-bound Hairball. Well, maybe not a horror film, but it sounds about right for the next case for Encyclopedia Brown or the Bobbsey Twins. Is either series even being written anymore, or am I revealing my age with those references?
Nope, looks like both are still being published. Guess I can't be that old, then, if at least some of the books I remember from my childhood are still in existence. Of course, I had the oldskool Bobbsey Twins books, the hardcover ones with the purple binding, that I'd inherited from my aunt.

Thinking back to that series as an adult, I'm mildly horrified at the inherent acceptance of racism and social division, with the black maid/servant couple. How exactly did a middle class family get the money for a pair of servants and various exotic trips? The series was one of the first that I really got into as a 7/8-year-old, so much so that I wrote a Bobbsey-style story for a writing assignment in grade 3. I guess I did a good job of imitating the style (the opening chapters were rather formulaic), as one of my classmates tried to convince the teacher that I'd plagiarized the whole thing...