Will My Love Keep Me Warm While My Furnace is Out? (WORST TITLE EVER)

Furnace Genius
My furnace repair guy had some interesting techniques. Also, no eyebrows.

My furnace went kaput last Friday.

It turns out you’re supposed to clean the filters every few months or so. You’d think this would have dawned on me after eight years of owning a place. But I’m kind of a moron when it comes to that stuff. I’m good at sitting down on the ground, pulling up a laptop and writing. I don’t do much cleaning except to say that I try to reduce clutter. That is my version of cleaning – putting things away. As the dust piles, it piles on empty tables. I’m proud of this. It’s a sad badge of honor.

Once I realized the furnace wasn’t working I pulled out the filter and took it into my walk in shower. I turned on the faucet and rained shower water upon the filter. Heavy black stuff (dust I guess) fell off and onto the floor of the stall. I then used my big toe to push the dirt into the center where the drain sits. I smushed it down. This is probably not protocol in the handbook for proper furnace maintenance. But I was naked at the time. I didn’t really want to get dressed to solve this problem.

The furnace kept blinking four red lights in a row. I took to Google and found out that my max limiter had most likely busted. A direct result of not cleaning the filter. Poops!

I looked at the thermometer. It read 62 °. That’s getting on the cold side. In fact once I saw it I felt instantly colder. It was a mind-f**k for sure.

Thankfully I live at the top floor of our building. This means I get the heat from all the other units. Probably the farts, too. No matter. I ain’t a complainer.

When I called the furnace guy, after $145 he confirmed what took me five minutes to find on Google for free. The max limiter was busted. It would take them until Tuesday to fix which meant I had the weekend to myself in the no-heat.

I had completely forgotten that I had bought a space heater for work. Problem with that purchase was that it blew every fuse in the office when I used it. That was a funny day. So I had taken it home where it was collecting the aforementioned dust.

The space heater worked just fine over the weekend and I only had to transport it from living room to bedroom. It even has a remote control. Things that shouldn’t have remote controls but have remote controls always excite me. Like ceiling fans, lighting, blinds, car starters, and now space heaters. I kept it at the same temperature the whole time so I didn’t get to use it all that often.

That last paragraph was  unnecessary. Oh well, it’s staying in!

This is funny – the technician tried to screw me. I had a coupon for $35 off. I told the dispatch woman on the phone as much, but only after she gave me the total amount. She said just to mention it to the guy when he was there and they’d take it off the bill.

When I mentioned I had a coupon he decided to add $35 to the bill and then subtract it out. Thankfully I had memorized the total given to me earlier and realized what he was doing. I called him out. He,  English  not being his first language used that as a convenient excuse to why he “misunderstood.” Thieves are great, aren’t they?

So, heat is now back and I really kind of miss the cold. It made me get used to something uncomfortable at first and then learn to live in it. I’d even say I got more done is the discomfort. There’s a life metaphor in here somewhere, but, who am I, Deepak Chopra?

Oh, by the way – I’m back. Get ready for the stupid.

Furnace Genius
My furnace repair guy had some interesting techniques. Also, no eyebrows.

13 thoughts on “Will My Love Keep Me Warm While My Furnace is Out? (WORST TITLE EVER)”

  1. Rabia @ TheLiebers says:

    Our furnace goes out every winter! This year we had the same issue as you did. Not cleaning the filters had caused a flux capacitor to overheat (or something like that). Our bill had weird problems too! The bill that the technician left us was for $300, including a $100 “part acquisition fee.” When I called to complain about being charged a hundred bucks for driving five minutes across town, the guy told me that the fee was only $35, but our bill was still $300 because the technician had only included estimates on some other stuff. Guess who I’m not calling next year when the furnace breaks!?!?! Or maybe, we’ll just remember to clean the filters…

  2. Quirky Chrissy says:

    When we had the big SnO-M-G a few years back, our power (and heat) went out. It was super sucktastic. And cold. Me and 12 blankets (12 blankets and I?) couldn’t stay warm.

    I love how you “cleaned” your filter. Sounds pretty logical to me.

  3. Natalie the Singingfool says:

    Way to come back strong. Also, way to call the shyster out on his shystyness.

  4. Julie DeNeen says:

    LOL. The mental picture of you cleaning the filter is rather disturbing.

  5. Emelie says:

    Welcome back!! 🙂

  6. Small Footprints says:

    I have a feeling that your next major expense is going to be to a plumber to unplug the shower drain. LOL! 🙂

  7. Lovelyn says:

    Glad you’re back.

  8. Dyanne @ I Want Backsies says:

    We once called the furnace repair person to come because a weird fluttering sound came from our furnace every time it came on. A $100 service call and the problem was diagnosed in about ten seconds – a piece of paper with some kind of specs on it and located on the inside door of the furnace blower was loose and would flutter every time the unit turned on. My husband nearly threw a clot when we received the bill.

  9. Andi-Roo (@theworld4realz) says:

    We haven’t had to call a service repair person for our furnace yet, but I just know it’s coming. Every year our heat is slow to work, and then we magically remember that we’re supposed to clean the filters periodically… so much like you, we rinse them in the shower (but not naked, cuz that’d just be weird, dude)… and then the heating works just fine. I’m waiting for the year when the big rinse doesn’t fix the problem. *blah* … Glad you got things back on track, and that you have returned to the land of blogging! 🙂

  10. Donna Beavers says:

    I love it–great writing with plenty description for mental images! So funny, and I am sure to you too now that you aren’t freezing your tukus off.

  11. Kate Hall says:

    When you wrote max limiter I kept thinking flux capacitor. Too much Back to The Future. Great and funny post. Glad you’re back!

  12. J Reynolds says:

    Thanks for the information. I wouldn’t recommend installing or doing a furnace repair, or repairing any home appliance that could be really dangerous if malfunctioning. I once caused a small gas leak trying to repair my hot water heater.

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