Friday, December 24, 2004

Christmas Eve Kerfuffle

After the afternoon walk with the dogs (just missing the downpour) we came in and I put the heating on because I was feeling a bit chilly. A little while later I was still chilly so I went to have a look at the boiler to find that it wasn't working. On switching it on, the pump started up and the burner light would come on briefly before going off again.

Oh. No heating and no hot water for Christmas. Great.

I rang the British Gas service line and they sent somebody out within the hour. He looked at the boiler and made that peculiar sucking sound with his teeth to indicate that this didn't look like being a ten minute job, so Mrs Dogwood nipped out to buy an electric heater just in case.

In the end, after the chappie had stripped everything down it turned out that some rain water had blown in through the air vent and filled the bit where the burner is, shorting out the control circuit that should keep it lit, and drying it out cured it. Huzzah for British Gas and huzzah for Asda who will take back the heater if we don't need it.

The second kerfuffle of the day came a little later when Mrs Dogwood put her cup of tea in the new microwave to warm it up for 20 minutes instead of 20 seconds and boiled it dry. Still no harm done, other than a rather interesting dried on tea pattern on the turntable in microwave, which is still working against all expectations.

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