winter blues

[aromulus]

I cannot believe it....

Good job that I popped home in between appointments with customers, or maybe I should not have...

After 20 minutes here, a contractor from the council knocks on the door for the annual gas fire/bolier check.
Some fiffin' and faffin' later, he announces that he had to condemn the appliance as unsafe (the fumes are blowing back inside), but graciously he would book me in for another check tomorrow, to make double sure.
The evening are getting cooler, the mornings even worse, but gratefully during the days is still pleasant enough to mess about in the flat just wearing lightish clothes.
The prognosis is grim.... If it fails tomorrows test, it will be a new combi boiler installation in the cards. I am ok with this for a lot of reasons, mainly economical ones...
But on the other hand it also means having to change all the radiators (7) and the pipes.... Floorboards up... New carpets up... Mess and incovenience and a wife that will have to wear a duvet around herself until the job is finished.
I am all for safety and appreciate the guy's work and commitment, but knowing Wrexham Council repair department from old.....
God only knows if we will get the damn thing sorted out before July next year....

If I hadn't come home... Jet would not have opened the door... Not even for the Pope...

The funny thing is that I hardly ever use the boiler/gas fire in winter as the family downstairs usually keep their heating to the maximum and a lot of that heat filters through to here. So it has always been nice and cosy.
So just in case I will have to invest in a couple of fan heaters and one of those new-fangled halogen thingies..

Oh, well.... f it....

[andypaul]

I can imagine the grief but look on the bright side at least a potentially dangrous applicance has been noticed. With Jet at home all day at the moment that could have been fatal.

[Shifty-Sidney]

Hey Dom, you mean your other half isnt wearing about 10 layers of clothes anyway? - get the boiler sorted and up to melt down - keep the good lady warm!
either that or share some body heat!

[aromulus]

Hey Dom, you mean your other half isnt wearing about 10 layers of clothes anyway? - get the boiler sorted and up to melt down - keep the good lady warm!
either that or share some body heat!

Dammit.

She will give me a heart attack, one of these days.
She insists on wearing shorts and t-shirts.
I spent a small fortune on coats, sweaters, shoes, you name it....
I have to be really firm and tell her to wear warmer stuff...
Seems like that the colder climate agrees with her, as for some unexplained reason her blood pressure decreased a lot.
As per sharing body heat.... well that goes without saying...
Yeah, Jet did ask why there was lots of "water" on the bedroom window pane and the sill in the mornings...
You getting too much info here, boy...

[andypaul]

My Wife did the same wearing shorts and t shirts and i think the leccy bill printers must have used most of their ink to print out the amount of units we used that first winter.

[PeterB]

Ah, so I'm not the only one to experience the t-shirt problem.

I'm for ever running round the house, looking to find where she's discarded the thick woolens - every time she says "I'm cold"!

[joebloggs]

well better be safe than sorry.. something like 50 people die a year thru Carbon monoxide poisoning caused by faulty heating appliances. you can buy a Carbon monoxide detector for about £20+ .

one of the crazy things thats happened to me, it was about 6yrs ago, at 6:30am, i was checking me downloads , and i could smell something burning, so i went outside but couldn't see anything, went back onto the pc, and i could see smoke starting to rise thru where the skirting boards, where i was sat, so i ran back out, still couldn't see anything, going back in the house, next to the kitchen we have a storage room, and inside is a gas boiler, and a window just above it, thru the window, i could see flames 6ft high, the boiler was on fire , ithe door has a padlock on, and my step dad who was asleep had the key, i got the house pipe from outside, i could just open the door enough to get the end of the hose pipe in, and tired to spray water onto the boiler, i then ran into the house, woke me step dad up, got the key, i was there like fireman Sam putting the thnig out, while he went to turn the gas off, found out later the burners in the boiler had fallen over, and instead of the flames go straight up, they were going thru the side of the case..

so be warned. we were lucky