Pilot Light
I’ve had working men at my villa doing all sorts of great things to beautify my little home these past few weeks. Well, some of the improvements really don’t fall into the beauty category.
They built me a 5K litter cistern! Yes, I am now one of the lucky ones who still has water even when the city pipes run dry.
I decided that since they needed to tear up my driveway, I might as well have them build me a carport. What a beauty it is transforming into! Then, it only made sense for them to tile the drive. It became a necessity to enhance the new structure. Oh, and the new gate. It’s next to the new construction, so we couldn’t let the old nasty looking gate take away from all that new beauty. They will soon be replacing it with an English garden gate… the kind of gate you would expect to see in a mansion’s garden.
I am enjoying all this. After living here over seven years, it’s about time I did something to my precious home.
With the commotion of the construction comes some good and bad stories. First, the good.
The work men are very nice, and love to smile. When I go out, I always say something funny to the boss by using my best Spanglish. I can tell when he understands me because he smiles, then turns to the others to repeat what I said in Espanol. That’s when I’m rewarded with their laughter. I just love these guys.
Now the bad.
Things get broken when there are workmen making things better for you.
I have a water system that I developed; it helps make my watering job easier. On two sides of my house, I have spigots. I enhanced both of them by connecting a T apparatus to the facets. This allows me to simply turn a lever for the water to gush on one side of my yard, while at the same time, have a lever to turn on the other. Wow, this cuts my work time in half (isn’t that the way of modern laziness?). Evidently, one of the workers didn’t understand how to use it. Suddenly, it was leaking… a thing that I could not live with. I waited until they went to lunch to fix it (I didn’t want to embarrass anyone). A quick trip to Home Depot gave me the supplies to put my invention back to perfection.
Then, I had a devastating experience with my main water to the house. Saturday evening, my ears noticed that my water pump was humming, a sound that I had grown used to… BEFORE I HAD THE NEW CISTERN INSTALLED. I ran outside, and sure enough, my new 5K litter cistern was empty! The pump was trying to pump water to the top of my house where my two tanks that feed my shower, everything inside live. But, it was doing that dry pumping thing. To my dismay, I turned off the pump, wondering if it was burnt out… damn! And, of course, it was discovered the night before the guys’ day off! I started investigating the problem, soon discovering the culprit. Someone had turned off the faucet that draws water from the nightly city flow. What?!
I turned on the flow, knowing that I would need to wait for morning to check the level in the cistern.
To my joy, the next morning, the water Gods had filled the cistern. But, I was still full of apprehension. Terrified that I was still in hot water, (go ahead, this is your break time to relieve your tension from my story and laugh) I turned on the pump. Damn! Still a humming sound. I decided to leave it on for 10 minutes to see if it would begin sucking the liquid gold from my cistern. I timed it. Amazing how quickly a day, month… even a season can pass me by, and yet, this segment of time seemed to be stagnant. When the time for my test finally completed, the hum was still ringing in my ears. Damn! I had nearly given up when a thought crossed through my mind. I went back to the crime scene and began toggling the switch for the pump. I had almost given up when I heard a tiny whimper of a heart beat. I suddenly felt like the star doctor in a movie flick. I wasn’t going to give up! I was going to bring this heartbeat back! I kept it up, running out of breath as I worked (that was probably my imagination seeing me give mouth to mouth), when there it was! The sound became strong, I had done it… I had saved the pump from the funeral palace where gadgets lay in peace!
Entonces, (that means and then in Espanol) the next mishap was discovered the following morning, it was early on Monday. I woke up realizing that my body was sticky from the extreme humidity in the air. I smiled before getting out of bed, anticipating the gratifying shower experience I was soon going to get. But when I tried to engage in this luxury, I discovered that there was no hot water. “Nooo!,” I exclaimed.
I dismantled from my shower effort, threw on some makeshift clothes, and went outside to the heat tank. What I saw dismayed me. The water hose had been draped over the dial of the apparatus so the new concrete path could be laid (I forgot to tell you about that enhancement). Evidently, the weight of the hose had made the pilot light go out.
“Ok,” I said aloud. “This is not a big problem, just relight the pilot.” I opened the little metal door to the tank and looked inside, but everything seemed blurry. “Oh,” again, I said out loud. I ran inside to find some reading glasses (they are strategically planted in each room of my home and even in each of my purses). When I returned to the tank in question, I peered inside. The blurriness was gone, but I still couldn’t see a place to light the pilot. Damn!
Now, there is something I need to enlighten (pun) you about myself… I pride myself on having done home improvements, and repairs to all my homes over the years. I have tiled floors, bathroom walls… installed toilets, electrical fixtures. I can do so many cool things without the help of a worker. With this new information, you should be able to understand my embarrassment over the fact that I was stumped over the lighting of a pilot light.
Many thoughts went through my mind. “Ok, the guys are due here in about an hour. I will ask one of them to light this thing.” To, “Maybe I don’t really need this shower, I have a day or so before people will notice my smell. That will give me time to look up a how-to recipe on the internet.”
When the men got to my home, I peered out the window… wondering, wondering. What should I do? Then, as luck would have it, I noticed one of the neighborhood gardeners had wandered over to my work site. He was sitting on a stack of cement bags talking to my work men.
I went outside, and said, “Ramone.” I used my index finger to motion him to follow me (many years ago, I saw this trick done in a Dippy Do commercial). He was wonderful, got it right away. He followed me around the corner of my house, I handed him a lighter, and pointed at my problem. He smiled, and went through the process of priming the pump, and then performed magic with the lighter. All was well, when we heard a distressing sound… it was aweful!
A skirmish sound from either a gecko or a baby iguana inside the tank made our eyes get big. We looked at each other with expressions of pain. Then he waved his hand and said, “Está bien.”
My eyes squinted, a brief thought went through my mind, and then I smiled. “Sí, está bien.” He walked one way to join his friends, and I walked the other to get ready for my shower.
The moral of this story? If you are going to live as a squatter, choose your hiding place carefully. Now, in all honesty, I believe the little guy was able to leave the way he entered.
Ahhh, no more problems. All is good. Wait, they still have another few weeks of improving my home!
__________________________________________________________
Got comments? You will find the comment box below this story.
__________________________________________________________
You can read all about drama in my novels. Check them out at www.cmichaelsbooks.com, author of Twisted Thrillers.
__________________________________________________________
They built me a 5K litter cistern! Yes, I am now one of the lucky ones who still has water even when the city pipes run dry.
I decided that since they needed to tear up my driveway, I might as well have them build me a carport. What a beauty it is transforming into! Then, it only made sense for them to tile the drive. It became a necessity to enhance the new structure. Oh, and the new gate. It’s next to the new construction, so we couldn’t let the old nasty looking gate take away from all that new beauty. They will soon be replacing it with an English garden gate… the kind of gate you would expect to see in a mansion’s garden.
I am enjoying all this. After living here over seven years, it’s about time I did something to my precious home.
With the commotion of the construction comes some good and bad stories. First, the good.
The work men are very nice, and love to smile. When I go out, I always say something funny to the boss by using my best Spanglish. I can tell when he understands me because he smiles, then turns to the others to repeat what I said in Espanol. That’s when I’m rewarded with their laughter. I just love these guys.
Now the bad.
Things get broken when there are workmen making things better for you.
I have a water system that I developed; it helps make my watering job easier. On two sides of my house, I have spigots. I enhanced both of them by connecting a T apparatus to the facets. This allows me to simply turn a lever for the water to gush on one side of my yard, while at the same time, have a lever to turn on the other. Wow, this cuts my work time in half (isn’t that the way of modern laziness?). Evidently, one of the workers didn’t understand how to use it. Suddenly, it was leaking… a thing that I could not live with. I waited until they went to lunch to fix it (I didn’t want to embarrass anyone). A quick trip to Home Depot gave me the supplies to put my invention back to perfection.
Then, I had a devastating experience with my main water to the house. Saturday evening, my ears noticed that my water pump was humming, a sound that I had grown used to… BEFORE I HAD THE NEW CISTERN INSTALLED. I ran outside, and sure enough, my new 5K litter cistern was empty! The pump was trying to pump water to the top of my house where my two tanks that feed my shower, everything inside live. But, it was doing that dry pumping thing. To my dismay, I turned off the pump, wondering if it was burnt out… damn! And, of course, it was discovered the night before the guys’ day off! I started investigating the problem, soon discovering the culprit. Someone had turned off the faucet that draws water from the nightly city flow. What?!
I turned on the flow, knowing that I would need to wait for morning to check the level in the cistern.
To my joy, the next morning, the water Gods had filled the cistern. But, I was still full of apprehension. Terrified that I was still in hot water, (go ahead, this is your break time to relieve your tension from my story and laugh) I turned on the pump. Damn! Still a humming sound. I decided to leave it on for 10 minutes to see if it would begin sucking the liquid gold from my cistern. I timed it. Amazing how quickly a day, month… even a season can pass me by, and yet, this segment of time seemed to be stagnant. When the time for my test finally completed, the hum was still ringing in my ears. Damn! I had nearly given up when a thought crossed through my mind. I went back to the crime scene and began toggling the switch for the pump. I had almost given up when I heard a tiny whimper of a heart beat. I suddenly felt like the star doctor in a movie flick. I wasn’t going to give up! I was going to bring this heartbeat back! I kept it up, running out of breath as I worked (that was probably my imagination seeing me give mouth to mouth), when there it was! The sound became strong, I had done it… I had saved the pump from the funeral palace where gadgets lay in peace!
Entonces, (that means and then in Espanol) the next mishap was discovered the following morning, it was early on Monday. I woke up realizing that my body was sticky from the extreme humidity in the air. I smiled before getting out of bed, anticipating the gratifying shower experience I was soon going to get. But when I tried to engage in this luxury, I discovered that there was no hot water. “Nooo!,” I exclaimed.
I dismantled from my shower effort, threw on some makeshift clothes, and went outside to the heat tank. What I saw dismayed me. The water hose had been draped over the dial of the apparatus so the new concrete path could be laid (I forgot to tell you about that enhancement). Evidently, the weight of the hose had made the pilot light go out.
“Ok,” I said aloud. “This is not a big problem, just relight the pilot.” I opened the little metal door to the tank and looked inside, but everything seemed blurry. “Oh,” again, I said out loud. I ran inside to find some reading glasses (they are strategically planted in each room of my home and even in each of my purses). When I returned to the tank in question, I peered inside. The blurriness was gone, but I still couldn’t see a place to light the pilot. Damn!
Now, there is something I need to enlighten (pun) you about myself… I pride myself on having done home improvements, and repairs to all my homes over the years. I have tiled floors, bathroom walls… installed toilets, electrical fixtures. I can do so many cool things without the help of a worker. With this new information, you should be able to understand my embarrassment over the fact that I was stumped over the lighting of a pilot light.
Many thoughts went through my mind. “Ok, the guys are due here in about an hour. I will ask one of them to light this thing.” To, “Maybe I don’t really need this shower, I have a day or so before people will notice my smell. That will give me time to look up a how-to recipe on the internet.”
When the men got to my home, I peered out the window… wondering, wondering. What should I do? Then, as luck would have it, I noticed one of the neighborhood gardeners had wandered over to my work site. He was sitting on a stack of cement bags talking to my work men.
I went outside, and said, “Ramone.” I used my index finger to motion him to follow me (many years ago, I saw this trick done in a Dippy Do commercial). He was wonderful, got it right away. He followed me around the corner of my house, I handed him a lighter, and pointed at my problem. He smiled, and went through the process of priming the pump, and then performed magic with the lighter. All was well, when we heard a distressing sound… it was aweful!
A skirmish sound from either a gecko or a baby iguana inside the tank made our eyes get big. We looked at each other with expressions of pain. Then he waved his hand and said, “Está bien.”
My eyes squinted, a brief thought went through my mind, and then I smiled. “Sí, está bien.” He walked one way to join his friends, and I walked the other to get ready for my shower.
The moral of this story? If you are going to live as a squatter, choose your hiding place carefully. Now, in all honesty, I believe the little guy was able to leave the way he entered.
Ahhh, no more problems. All is good. Wait, they still have another few weeks of improving my home!
__________________________________________________________
Got comments? You will find the comment box below this story.
__________________________________________________________
You can read all about drama in my novels. Check them out at www.cmichaelsbooks.com, author of Twisted Thrillers.
__________________________________________________________
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