L’évier est bouché, alors j’appelle le plombier.

Because évier begins with a vowel, French usually shortens le to l’ before it.

• le évier → not used
• l’évier → correct

This is called elision. The noun is still masculine, but the article changes form before a vowel sound.

Évier is masculine.

That is why the basic article is le:

• le évier → becomes l’évier
• not la évier

You can also see the masculine agreement in bouché, which ends in -é here because it agrees with a masculine singular noun.

Here, bouché means blocked, clogged, or stopped up.

So L’évier est bouché means the sink is clogged.

In everyday French, bouché is commonly used for things like:

• un évier bouché = a clogged sink
• des toilettes bouchées = clogged toilets
• une canalisation bouchée = a blocked pipe

French often uses être + past participle to describe a state.

So:

• L’évier est bouché = the sink is clogged / blocked

Here, bouché is functioning like an adjective describing the condition of the sink.

This is different from talking about the action itself. For example:

• Quelqu’un a bouché l’évier = someone clogged the sink
• L’évier est bouché = the sink is in a clogged state

Because it agrees with l’évier, which is masculine singular.

Agreement would change like this:

• un évier bouché = masculine singular
• une canalisation bouchée = feminine singular
• des éviers bouchés = masculine plural
• des canalisations bouchées = feminine plural

So in this sentence, bouché matches l’évier.

Here, alors means so, therefore, or in that case.

It connects cause and result:

• L’évier est bouché = the sink is clogged
• alors j’appelle le plombier = so I call the plumber

In everyday speech, alors is very common and natural.

Yes, often you could.

• L’évier est bouché, alors j’appelle le plombier.
• L’évier est bouché, donc j’appelle le plombier.

Both can mean So I call the plumber.

A simple difference:

• alors often sounds a bit more like a natural consequence in speech
• donc can sound slightly more logical or formal, though it is also very common

In this sentence, either works.

Because je becomes j’ before a vowel or silent h. This is another case of elision.

So:

• je appelle → not used
• j’appelle → correct

French does this to make pronunciation smoother.

Because it comes from the verb appeler.

In the je form of the present tense, the spelling changes:

• j’appelle
• tu appelles
• il/elle appelle
• nous appelons
• vous appelez
• ils/elles appellent

The double l helps show the pronunciation pattern in these forms. This is a common stem-changing pattern in French verbs like appeler.

French present tense can cover both ideas depending on context.

So j’appelle can mean:

• I call
• I am calling

In this sentence, it probably means something like:

• The sink is clogged, so I’m calling the plumber or
• The sink is clogged, so I call the plumber

English usually chooses between simple present and present progressive more strictly than French does.

Both are possible, but they do not feel exactly the same.

• j’appelle le plombier often means I’m calling the plumber, meaning the relevant or expected plumber, or simply the plumber as the person for this job
• j’appelle un plombier means I’m calling a plumber, emphasizing any plumber, one plumber among others

French often uses the definite article in places where English might also use the in a general practical sense:

• appeler le médecin
• prendre le bus
• fermer la porte

So le plombier sounds very natural here.

Yes. Un plombier means a plumber.

It comes from plomb, meaning lead, because plumbing historically involved lead pipes. But in modern French, plombier simply means the profession plumber.

A simple pronunciation guide is:

Lay-vyay ay boo-shay, ah-lor zhah-pell luh plom-byay.

A few useful notes:

• évier sounds roughly like ay-vyay
• bouché sounds like boo-shay
• j’appelle begins with the j sound in measure
• plombier ends roughly like byay

The b in plombier is pronounced, but the m changes the vowel sound before it.

Not really any major required liaison here.

For example:

• est bouché does not usually have a liaison
• alors j’appelle does not create a standard liaison either

The main pronunciation features to notice are the elisions:

• l’évier
• j’appelle

So the sentence flows smoothly mostly because of those apostrophes, not because of liaison.

You could, and it would be understood, but bouché is more natural for a sink, pipe, or drain.

• bouché = clogged, stopped up
• bloqué = blocked, stuck

For plumbing problems, French speakers usually prefer bouché.

Yes. Since French present tense is flexible, the sentence could also describe a repeated situation in the right context.

For example:

• Chaque fois que l’évier est bouché, alors j’appelle le plombier. = Every time the sink gets clogged, I call the plumber.

Without extra context, though, most people would understand the original sentence as a present situation.