On Saturday, I was out much of the morning running errands and essentially just enjoying the day. I got home around the middle of the day and thought I would start some laundry before going to a party later in the afternoon. I headed downstairs and noticed that it was rather warm and humid – unusual for my basement. Or basements in general, I guess. Anyway, it only took me a moment to identify the problem.
The hot water tank was leaking.
Though ‘leaking’ is actually a mild term for what it was doing. The water was actually geysering out of the top of the tank like a little fountain, then running down the side of the tank and across the floor. I started shutting things off and closing valves – then had a friend come over to help me assess the situation and verify that my house wasn’t going to explode.
With everything as secure as it could be and no damage in the basement – other than the water tank itself – I headed to the party. Only to find that I had the day wrong and it was actually on Sunday.
That night, I took a very very quick and very very cold shower – grateful that this had happened in the summer when I could at least recover from the cold quickly.
Sunday was spent with friends and then later some downtime with video games. As the evening wore on, I decided to run some bathwater and let it warm up to room tempeture. Which is a fine idea except that the stopper in my tub isn’t very good and by the time I was ready for my bath, the water had all drained out.
So, I sort of squatted down in a shallow tub of very cold water and had a very quick bath. I’m not usually one to take a long time getting cleaned up, but this may have been a new record.
Today, I was up early and started draining the tank the rest of the way – then went on into work and called a HVAC company to come out and look at it. They were able to come by this afternoon and I was able to meet them at the house and show them what was going on. As expected, the tank is a loss, but then were able to schedule a new tank and install for tomorrow morning. One more cold bath and I’ll be back to normal – though I am getting a little tired of all the sudden expenses. First the car, now the water heater. I can swing it, but it’s making me crankier than usual.