The gas fireplace insert (and only form of central heating we have in our home) is working again! That is really good news because it was seriously cold in our house this morning. The thermometer on the remote for the stove read 41 degrees. The plumber showed up unexpectedly and said let's just have a look at it. The problem? It's too complicated to go into here in this little blog. The repair guy had to have very complicated diagnostic equipment to figure it all out. OK, the darn thing wasn't turned on. You have to move the dial to pilot when you start it up, and I thought it went back to the normal position when you were done, but it doesn't. It stays on pilot forever. So, the short answer was to turn on the gas. Misty, our cat if very happy. We call the fireplace her winter worship location. She's done pretty well with a house that's seven feet in the air and with construction crews making constant noise under her feet, but she did not like the cold. She's back to worshiping again and we're all a lot happier and warmer.
Still the weirdest thing about the house being on stilts is the washing machine. We have a front loader and when it goes into the spin cycle it shakes the whole house gently back and forth. It's like being in an earthquake. Your house just isn't suppose to sway back and forth, even if it's gently during the spin cycle. I suppose I'll get use to it and then it will be weird when it doesn't do it anymore.
I was able to stay out of the mud today for which I'm very thankful. The plumbing inspector is coming tomorrow and I just know that means several trips back into the mud to reassemble several of the questionable plumbing runs I've put together. More mud, more plumbing, many, many more trips back to the hardware store. I starting to look forward to taking a trip up to Tacoma and Seattle on Thursday with 50 plus high school students, just to get away from the list of things I have to get done. Of course it will all be waiting for me when I get back.
Our quartet is singing at the Covenant Church on Saturday at 7:00 p.m.. It's a fundraiser for the Yamhill County Gospel Mission Homeless Center. They are trying to raise money to put in a fire suppression sprinkler system so that they can house more people at a time. I guess there's only one thing worse than having to do plumbing, and that's having no plumbing (and no house) at all.