Water, Water Everywhere!

Or at least that's what it seemed like at my house Tuesday night. Everything seemed fine until Casey discovered that we had no water pressure anywhere in the house. The same thing had happened about 3 weeks ago, when the city was doing some water line work. We casually shrugged it off as the same. Then, as I was getting ready for bed in the bathroom, I heard some very strange sounds on the other side of the wall. I figured that I had better go out and investigate. I went into the bedroom and opened my closet door. That's when I quickly discovered that the water heater had rusted through and busted. Now the drunken idiots that designed my old house many years ago, had put a gas water heater in my closet without emergency turnoffs. Water was spraying like a garden hose on everything in my closet!! The first thing we had to do was make sure to do was to cut the gas off. Not only was the pilot light on, but the water heater was constantly on heating up, since it was losing water. We thought we were going to have an explosion, before we could get it shut off. Then, we kept trying to find the water cutoffs, only to discover there were none. So, we had to call the water company to shut the water off at the street. Meanwhile.... my clothes, floor, and everything else was getting sprayed with water. Casey ran to the kitchen and the bathroom and threw every faucet we have wide open to divert some of the water from the water heater. Finally, the water was shut off. The next thing was to get everything out of the closet. Everything ended up on the bed, so Casey and I slept on the couches after finally getting settled about 2 a.m. Meanwhile.....water continued to leak out of the rusted hole all night and all day Wednesday.

Casey and I headed out to Lowe's early Wednesday morning to get a new water heater. Unfortunately, they wouldn't deliver it until the next day. So, we waited and the water heater kept dripping. After we got home from Lowe's, (who by the way, didn't mention that we had to buy the drain pan separately. They were so bothered they had to help us that morning) we called our plumber/electrician. Since codes wouldn't let us replace the gas water heater with gas without MAJOR modifications to our bedroom, we had to replace it with electric. This required some major rewiring. Our regular plumber was out of town (isn't that always the way?), so we had to go through the list in the phone book. By late Wednesday afternoon, it wasn't looking good. Everyone kept telling us, it would be late NEXT week. I just wanted to scream, "I CAN'T EVEN GO TO THE BATHROOM PEOPLE!!! I HAVE NO WATER AT ALL!!!" Finally, my neighbors across the street recommended someone. They said to call, when the water heater was delivered, and they'd come right out. FINALLY! Around 5 p.m. yesterday afternoon, we had water, hot and cold, at last. Now we are battling with the wet carpet. We keep sucking the water up every hour. Tonight, we are putting a big de-humidifier in there with a box fan. Hopefully, that will get the last of it. We are certainly not ready to replace the carpet yet. That's been my week, how about ya'll?