[font=courier][b]entropy[\/b] – en\u00b7tro\u00b7py, n: the degradation of the matter and energy in the universe to an ultimate state of inert uniformity b: a process of degradation or running down or a trend to disorder[\/font]<\/p>\n
About the middle of last week, in our push to get the house cleaned up a little (many, many chores have gone un-done in the last few months!), I decided to wash our plush bath mat. Without thinking, I tossed it in the laundry with the other dish towels and old burp cloths that we use for dusting and the like. After letting the washer do it’s thing, I went down to the laundry room an hour or so later to put everything in the dryer when I saw that the digital readout on the washer indicated that the load was out of balance. I adjusted it and let it go again. After about 20 minutes, I went back and now it was indicating that the machine was not draining properly…great! I fiddled with some stuff, set new programs and never got the thing to drain. My guess is that some of the fibers from the mat got sucked into the pump (which is notorious for being easily clogged). I immediately went to the Sears website and put in a repair request – we have the good extended warranty on the washer that covers pretty much everything for at least 5 years. It’s a good thing that we got that because there is a lot of bad press about the Kenmore Calypso washers like ours. You can do the research on your own. Of course, the first available service date was December 18th – almost two weeks out! ugh! With four of us in the house, we do a fair amount of laundry, so this was not good news.<\/p>\n
Saturday brought more good news. As I was hanging out with the kids on Saturday morning (Robyn and I take turns sleeping in on the weekends and Saturday is her day), it got quiet for a second and I heard what sounded like a weird whispering noise coming from downstairs. I made sure the kids were not likely to get into anything and ran down. Turning from the stairs to go into our family room, I heard water running in the laundry room. I immediately feared the worst because I had yet to drain the last of the water from the washing machine breakdown earlier in the week. As I opened the door, I saw a pretty large puddle in the middle of the laundry room, but the water was not coming from the washer as I feared. Instead, it was pouring, in a nice stream, from the oft-replaced pressure relief valve that sits between the water supply from outside and our holding tank. I quickly flipped the switch to turn off the pump, grabbed the small jug that we have sitting under the valve in case of drips and emptied that into the toilet – getting my feet soaked in the meantime. Then I ran upstairs and woke Robyn to have her watch the kids while I figured out how to get the water to stop. After running back down, I tried to remember how to stop the flow of water…we’ve been through this before! I hurriedly turned the valve that feeds the rest of the house and turned on the water in the bathroom sink in an effort to drain the holding tank. Of course, this was wrong. I should have left the valve open! As I was trying to figure out why the water wasn’t stopping, I was yelling upstairs to Robyn to get the number of the plumber we used before. This is pretty comical as I think back on it….<\/p>\n
Anyway, long story short, I got the water to stop and we got a plumber to come by around half-past noon. He determined the problem was silt jacking up the pump pressure switch, causing it to run too long and pushing the pressure up in the tank. A few hundred dollars later, we were back in business. Of course, due to this, I couldn’t make it to class, so I asked Doug to teach in my place. This was the first time I have had someone take over class for me and I felt oddly guilty about it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
[font=courier][b]entropy[\/b] – en\u00b7tro\u00b7py, n: the degradation of the matter and energy in the universe to an ultimate state of inert uniformity b: a process of degradation or running down or a trend to disorder[\/font] About the middle of last week, … Continue reading