CONDEMNATION

The condemned soul on the morning of the execution

So it all started with a letter in the mail about having our furnace cleaned for $69. How could it possibly wrong we thought. Jon and I talked about it before I scheduled the appointment and agreed that it was a great idea after we hadn't done anything with the furnace since we moved in 2 years ago and Grandpa kept the thermostat set at 80 F for most of the year (usually around June or July he would the heat off until Labor Day or so) and we wore shorts in the house year round and were fine.

Monday was the day of the appointment. I should have know it wasn't going to be a good one when the baby woke up on the wrong side of the crib and was super cranky all day. Turns out she has a cold so I cut her some slack and plugged in the humidifier in her room and applied vapo-rub to her chest. Jon ended up coming home sick from school that day- that NEVER happens. He hasn't come home sick from school in the 2 1/2 years that I've known him. He had a migraine so I made him lunch and sent him to bed to get some rest. I had actually forgotten about the furnace cleaning until after Jon had already come home. I just prayed that the tech wouldn't make too much noise and wake either Jon or Geagen.

The technician showed up on time and I was all business- do you want me to show you where the furnace is? He tells me that he wants to tell me about the company and about himself and all of their qualifications and programs. I'm thinking that they're going to try and hard-sell us some service plan when he's done with the cleaning and inspection and am dreading this sales pitch. Finally he's done with his spiel and even invites me to watch the proceedings. I thought why not-both Jon and the baby are asleep.

First thing he notices is that the flame guard is up and is allowing the ignition spark to melt the wires. So he puts the flame guard down and moves on to something else. (I'm not going to even mention that the flue was unhooked- it probably happened when the plumbers were re plumbing the hall bathroom in March 2007- and was spewing carbon monoxide into our house.) He then finds the first petrified mouse carcass. I was starting to be fearful at this point. Then he moves on to the blower and finds the second petrified muse carcass and also tells me that the blower needs to be taken apart and cleaned which is not included in the $69 cleaning and will cost an additional $99. I tell him that I need to talk it over with my husband who is home sick from work and is asleep upstairs. Now it's time to do a video inspection of the heat exchangers. He used water to check for cracks and leaks- if it came through to the other side then there were cracks. We had cracks in 4 out 5 of the heat exchanger vents. Then he tells me that our furnace is ancient- 30 plus years (made me feel real good) and that it's all one piece and even if they could put in a new heat exchanger that they don't make parts for old furnaces these days. I'm thinking to myself that in a few years we can get a new furnace because how bad can it be? Turns out those cracks were also leaking carbon monoxide in the house too and that he would have to "condemn" (I swear I'm not making this up!) our furnace and unplug it and turn off the gas line right then and there. Trying not to cry and not knowing what else to do I went upstairs to get my husband. He'd been asleep for 3 hours and he didn't even hear when I opened the door. I finally get him awake and he's under the influence of migraine meds and has no idea where he is, who I am or what I'm jabbering about. I finally get through to him and explain the gravity of the situation. I desperately needed him to talk some sense into this technician because our furnace was fine- we'd had it on since September and we were all fine with no problems. Jon goes and talks to the technician and realizes that it's a lost cause and that we are going to have to get a new furnace- now! We ask the guy to give us a ballpark estimate of how much a new furnace costs just so we can get an idea of what we've gotten ourselves into. He says between $2,000 and $10,000. We think to ourselves that's not cheap but not the end of the world. The technician calls the home office and schedules an appointment with a "comfort specialist" to come that evening and help us pick out a new furnace. He then tells us that he's going to get some space heaters out of the truck so we won't freeze. He comes back with 2 tiny (8" x 12") space heaters and we thought he was kidding. He wasn't- turns out those little things were ceramic heaters and actually put out quite a bit of heat. We put one in Geagen's room and one in the living room and waited for the "comfort specialist".

The "comfort specialist" arrived he was really nice so of course Jon and I befriended him. It took a little over 3 hours for all of the measuring and decisions, etc. because we would get so busy chatting. We decided to upgrade to a 90% efficient furnace so we could save on energy costs and also added central air because they were already going to be in there and we might as well do it right the first time. We got a super efficient heat pump (16 seers) and we signed all the paperwork and realized this was going to cost a small fortune but were glad because Jon had just gotten a raise after lengthy union negotiations. We had to add duct work and upgrade our electrical from 100 amp service to 200 amp service and that added to the cost. Jon did calculate that the system we chose would pay for itself in energy savings in 14 years- the silver lining. We agree that the installers will be here on Wednesday morning after the electrician was out to bid out his portion of the job.

Tuesday morning rolls around and Jon wakes me up and announces that after doing some Internet research he is reasonably sure that he has pink eye. He was right about that and called in sick and got a substitute for the next 2 days. Since he felt good but was contagious we decided that it was a great time to clean the crap out of the basement. It took the better part of the day but we got lots done before the installers came. The project manager and "comfort specialist" came by to see what this job would entail. Then we found out that the 16 seer heat pump was out of stock and that all they had was 18 seer heat pump that would add an additional 15% energy efficiency to the system we were already installing. So it was a good day after all.

Wednesday rolls around and Jon is still home sick and we were up early tying up loose ends from the basement cleaning project. The installers come and get started. It was a slow start because everyone was trying to figure out how to orient the furnace to make the installation as easy as possible. Finally they got it worked out and started getting this moving and they made lots of progress. We found a spot for the new heat return (the old one was to small) and a new location for the programmable thermostat. Then we realized that Jon was leaving for Portland that night and that it would probably be a good idea to get things packed and any necessary laundry done. We got everything done on time and picked up the other teachers who were carpooling with Jon for the conference in Portland. (Jon went to the National Science Teachers Association conference and got to meet Adam and Jamie of the Discovery Channel show "Mythbusters" on Thursday morning. I will post pictures when Jon comes on Saturday with the camera.)

On the way home from the airport I discover that I have a sore throat. This is a bad omen. I get up on Thursday morning and have a fever. I go the doctor and am somewhat relieved to just have an upper respiratory infection and not strep throat or anything like that. I also had Geagen get one of her shots that they were out of at her 4 month check-up. The installers were busily working away all day and told me what was going on- the electrician would be here on Monday to replace the breaker box but I would be able to use the furnace all weekend. They told me that tomorrow they would add the new vents and hook up the a/c and the heat pump. I was curious if all installations took 4 days to complete because this seemed like a very long process. It turns out that it normally only takes them one day to install a system. Leave it to Jon and I to be complicated. Then one of the pipes broke in the crawl space. We have 60 plus year old pipes around here so it was bound to happen. Of course the local hardware store didn't have the replacement pipe they need so had to put a cap on it until they could get the right pipe for it tomorrow morning. Thankfully it's the cold water pipe in the hall bathroom so it's not a huge ordeal.

It's late on Thursday night and I have the heat and it's wonderful. It's so warm it's practically balmy in here. Pretty soon everything will done and Jon and I will be able to give guided tours of the new system in our free time.