I will first confess this isn't actually about watering a garden but I am hoping someone can help me accomplish the following feat using gardening know-how.

I've got an air conditioner in a window on my front deck, and I have a bucket catching water underneath it.

I had the bright idea to submerge a length of hose in the bucket and just hope that I could coax the water through the hose and off of the deck. Draining the entire bucket is easy enough but my aim is to not have to do this daily.

The hose simply rises up out of the bucket and runs the length of the deck until it hangs over the side.

I did accidentally and inexplicably get this to work and it kept working for as long as two months. Then someone had to go and touch the hose and now it wont drip on its own any more despite my best attempts.

Can someone tell me exactly what should be where to reliably set this working again?