I should have known that I wouldn’t be able to wrap up last week’s water leak in a neat little bow and forget about it like last year’s Christmas presents….that I forgot I bought in July, and are still shoved in the top of a closet somewhere. Sometimes it doesn’t pay to for me to think I’m on top of things.
After the plumber fixed the pipe leak coming into the hot water heater last week, he re-lit the pilot light like a good plumber would. I even checked it after he left.
The next morning as I hurried around packing and getting ready to leave for the weekend to see our oldest daughter’s basketball team play in the State tournament, I jumped in the shower only to find cold water. Yikes! Not what I was expecting.
After a VERY quick cold shower. I checked the hot water heater. Pilot light was still lit, but the burner wouldn’t fire. After Rob and I discussing it throughout the weekend and searching online and taking several cold showers, we figured that chances are, it was most likely something other than a $15 thermocouple.
So considering our water heater is well past it’s 6 year warranty (at 19 years old!!) and deciding that we wouldn’t throw good money after bad (and the $100 we already spent to stop the water from spewing out of the top of this thing), we decided to bite the bullet and get a new water heater.
Now this is where it gets interesting…because, you know, it’s us.
As of April 2015, water heaters must meet a certain level of energy efficiency, which sounds like a good thing. But to do that, they have to bulk up an already bulky item — the tank. So if your water heater is less than 55 gallons, you’ll probably be looking at a unit only an inch or two larger here or there. But over that, and the units can be significantly bigger to gain the energy efficiency now required.
We, of course, have this nice hefty beast in our closet that comes in at 75 gallons. A new 75 gallon unit that is any bigger, probably won’t fit.
From looking at the picture, it may appear that there is all kinds of wiggle room for a larger tank in there. I would also like to believe my jeans have more wiggle room and I can therefore snack away on that pound of dark chocolate almonds in my pantry that are calling my name this very minute. Wrong on both accounts.
So now we’re looking at moving the location of the water heater out to the garage — right outside the little storage area where the water heater closet currently is — and right where our extra fridge currently is. Finding a new place for the fridge is easy. Re-routing the water pipes and gas line through the attic out here, not so much.
I take that back. It’s not hard, but it will cost you. I wish I could pay my plumber in dirty laundry. We seem to have an abundance of that — money, as it turns out, really does not grow on trees, or next to dirty socks.
And of course my sweet plumber has to throw in another option. Since we’re re-routing plumbing and venting, do I want to think about a tankless unit?
Ummm, no. I really do not want to think about any of this.
But….. now that I am thinking about this, I’ve got ideas….
Future plans…..
I really want to open this little storage room into the dining room and turn it into a little butler’s pantry (I also hope to knock down the wall between the dining room and kitchen someday and make it a really big kitchen.)
And if we build a little cold room out into the garage (accessible from the other side only), we can get rid of this other refrigerator and have a larger area for drinks and veggies. (And maybe a bottle of wine.)
Kind of like this crude cave-man-like attempt at a sketch below. Hieroglyphics not included.
Or a little further inside.
The nice thing about this room is that it already has a sink plumbed to it (it’s just beyond the right side of this picture, where that white bucket is. Doesn’t everyone have junk piled in front of their sinks?)
Because it seems like a butler’s pantry should have a sink. I don’t know why, it just does. I don’t even know what I would use it for. All those lavish parties I have with the Denton elite, maybe? My taffeta ballgown and I digress.
It turns out I’m kind of like the cautionary tale of “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.” I now want to tear down walls and build new walls and buy all the things for my lavish new fancy butlers pantry.
But here we are. Waiting to see the initial plumbing quote so we can once again have hot water and pretend we live like normal people.
I will probably only need to sell one kidney.
