Confessions of a hot water addict

There are certain things in life you never want to see, like a pile of dog poop by the door or a flat tire on your van when you want to leave for a show at 4 a.m.

A large puddle under your water heater is one of those things.

This was the floor under our water heater last Friday. Not good. TG it’s a cement floor. But still. That’s not the point. The water is supposed to be in the heater, not on the floor.


This is the warning sign on the side of the water heater. Trust me, we were in no danger of receiving any kind of burn from the water that came out of it.



That’s because most of the water was on the floor. What was left did not have much scald potential.

This is why the Farmer and I have been taking two-minute showers for the last week.

Okay, the Farmer normally takes a two-minute shower anyway. He’s a guy. Guys are like that. I like to spend a little more time in the shower. The teen-age days of lingering for 20 minutes (doG, did I really do that? No wonder my parents freaked about the electric bill) are long gone. Of course, so is my long hair. I’ll blame that for my extended showering time back in the day. Maintaining ‘80s hair was a time consuming commitment, what with all the shampoo, rinses and conditioners to apply. But I digress.

I discovered the water heater’s pending demise at 5:15 p.m. last Friday. Of course, the local plumber closed at 5 p.m. If it had been a true emergency, I’m sure he would have come out. For a price.

We decided we could make it through the weekend. After all, the heater was still heating, just not as much. The Farmer would call the plumber Monday morning. He would come install a new unit and life would be good.

Saturday, Sunday and Monday morning’s showers were speedy affairs. No lingering. No soaking. The fear of getting doused with cold water kept me moving. I take a very dim view of cold showers.

Monday, the Farmer called me at work. The plumber couldn’t come out until Wednesday. WEDNESDAY? That was two whole showers away, four if you counted the Farmer’s. I had visions of standing in the yard, using the garden hose to wash my hair. Don’t laugh. I’ve done it before, while camping at an agility trial.

I started having flashbacks to the ice storm of 2007 that knocked out our power for a week and sent me scrambling like a homeless waif from door to door to beg a hot shower. Okay. It wasn’t that bad. (Well, yeah, it WAS that bad — it was February and we didn’t have any electricity and it was pretty much the same temperature in the house as it was outdoors and Phoenix was just a baby dog and I was heating water in an antique coffee boiler atop our gas grill just to do basic washing up. But I digress.)

I awaited Wednesday with the anticipation of a little kid at Christmas. I rushed home after work, flung open the basement door, raced down the steps and found . . .

. . . a brand new water heater. Isn’t she beautiful?