The most exciting thing that's happening

Hello, February! January is the month of new beginnings. March is the month of welcoming Spring. So what is February? It's the month of survival! It's cold and unwelcoming, and though it boasts Groundhog day, President's day and Valentine's day, February still seems to be the most lackluster month in the calendar year. Poor February.

I was on the phone with my mom last week and she commented on my lack of blogging. Mostly she wanted more pictures. I told her the truth: I haven't taken any pictures because I don't do anything. Andy is in the middle of his season and doesn't have a lot of time to spend with me. On his day's off he's tired and I feel bad asking him to go, go, go with me all over, so we mostly stay home. I'm used to this, but in NC I had a car and a working knowledge of the area I was in. It was easier for me to get out and about and do things on my own. Here though I'm car-less (for the time being) and it takes an eternity to go anywhere on the bus. Plus there are only so many places I'm familiar with and feel comfortable going alone. We've only been here three months, after all. I have a feeling in a couple more months there will be much more to tell. Ski season is always sort of a slow time for us.

Anyway, there is one thing that has happened. Our heat broke.

Last Monday I woke up and had to force myself out of bed because it seemed extra chilly in our room. That's not unusual. Our bedroom always runs a few degrees colder than the rest of the apartment. Except when I came into the common area it was cold too, and that is not normal. The heat usually works overtime and I'm hot in the living room. I looked at the thermostat and it said 65. Again, that's not normal. I turned the heat up and nothing happened. I knew something was wrong, but waited until Andy got home so he could investigate. (That was his day off & he'd gone out for the morning, but came home at lunch.) He did some poking and prodding and determined that the motor was broken.

We contacted the property manager & after a quick look to make sure he knew the problem he called the repair man and ordered the part. This was Monday, the part and repair man should arrive on Wednesday. In the mean time he gave us three space heaters (one that was broken), plus we had one of our own. They worked pretty well because the apartment isn't large. Also, we are surrounded by other units in a concrete building. We're pretty well insulated and when I started to think about it, I had actually been a little chilly for two or three days. It's likely the heat had been broken for a while, but it took some time to realize it because the apartment holds the warmth so well. Go figure.

Wednesday came and so did the repair man, late, of course. He took one look and told me he was pretty sure the motor wasn't the only problem. Not one to give up easily, he took everything apart before he made his final diagnosis. Indeed, the motor wasn't enough. More parts had to be "tracked down" and another appointment would need to be made with the repair man once the other parts arrived.

Now, all this was fine. We had the space heaters, the apartment holds heat well and the temperature had taken a sharp turn towards "warm" for several days. It was like a tropical heat wave here last week. If you consider 40 degrees warm, and we do after averaging in the high teens to low twenties for weeks. So, not big deal about the heat. Except yesterday the temperature dropped again. The high was in the teens, plus there was more snowfall, and today the high is forecasted to be just over 0.

I realize that no one is really to blame for our heat still being broken, but at this point I would really appreciate some haste in getting it fixed. Not to mention that it's cold enough now that the space heaters need to be constantly running which 1) makes me nervous and 2) causes the breaker to flip regularly, annoying.

Yesterday the property manager stopped in to say that the new parts and repair man should be here today. I hope he's right. In the meantime, I'm going to put on an extra pair of socks.