Saturday, January 24, 2009

The Joys of Running Water!

Finally, on Friday, exactly a week after my water main froze, it miraculously thawed out again! I really don't have a lot more to say, other than it's awfully nice to be able to wash my hands without thawing out snow and to be able to flush the toilet without having to bum water off my neighbor!

Friday, January 16, 2009

The Dead of Winter...

On this perticular winter day, according to the National Weather Service, the high temperature here in the town of Texas was a sultry 2 degrees Ferenheit! Needless to say it's been a rather a cold day!
This morning I woke up to a low temperature of -16 degrees... Owing to this extreme cold my car wouldn't start... As a result I was two hours late to work, however because of my position I was able to make it up at the end of the shift. I thought that was the end of my problems but...
When I got home today at 7:00 I noticed that the stove had gone out. This is not surprising, as last night it blasted it's way through about 40 pounds of coal just to keep the house above 60 degrees. After I got my fire built and lit I went to wash my hands, opened the faucet and... Nothing happened! It turns out that through the course of the day the "Christmas Tree" (the slang term for the head of an Artesian oil well, I call my water head that because it closely resembles one) had frozen, despite the use of heater tape. This, of course, leaves me without water...
After spending close to two hours out in the bitter cold (about -5 at that point) fighting to remove the heater tape from the Christmas Tree, then chasing the plumbing from the bar water outlet to the floor with a propane torch I finally gave up, put a space heater in the plumbing room, sealed it back up and came in the house to get thawed back out. I am hoping that this, combined with the comparatively "warm" high temperature of tommorow (a mere 22 degrees) that the pipes will thaw back out... However it is going to get down to -12 tonight, so I am doubtful if I will get any results before tommorow...