Hot Water

A new hot water heater was installed in our house today. The old one still worked, but the pilot light sometimes went out (and I had to lie on the floor in the laundry room -- not one of our better places) to relight it, and the water tended to run out before my hair was rinsed. The old heater was 26 years old -- can you imagine? -- and we decided to replace it before it absolutely quit on us. We've been through that no-hot-water-for-two-days thing before, and didn't want to go there again.

The old heater was not quite installed up to the current code and the slightly upgraded model heater, plus installation, plus the code upgrades (one thing still has to be done, but we will do it ourselves) came to about the cost to replace our wall oven and range top. Now I'm glad to have the security of a newer water heater, but can you think of anything less exciting to spend over $1000 on? Most appliances are fun to replace because the new one always does something cool the old one didn't do. Water heaters: not so much. They basically sit in a closet and heat water.

You will find me very clean for a while. I'm taking lots of hot showers to make sure I get my money's worth. Oh, and the floor of our laundry room/cat bathroom got mopped. The cats think they got an upgrade.