the woes of home ownership

Well ... it could be worse. I could be writing this while sitting in a foot of water, but I'm not--luckily, I am writing this with a brand new water heater installed yesterday morning. On Sunday, I went to start up a load of laundry. When I stepped on the rug in front of the washer, it was soaking wet! I thought 'oh, man! the washer is broken!'. It was not. In fact, I traced the puddle of water to the water heater ... just beside the washing machine. And there I saw it ... small streaks of dried water down the side of the heater ... and when I put my finger next to the lid, I could feel a slow, but steady, stream trickling down to the floor. I mopped up the small mess, and I called my Dad.
"Dad, how much do you know about water heaters?"
He cornily replies, "They supply your house with hot water." Thanks, Dad.
"Can I fix a small leak?" I ask.
"From the pipes?" he inquires.
"Uh ... no ... from the top," I reply.
"Looks like you'll have to get yourself a new water heater," he informs me. Ugh! Just what we need. Well, on the bright side of it all, the water heater didn't explode everywhere, and we were never without hot water. I also found a super nice plumber, and after checking around to many places, also found that he had the best price. So, he came and installed a new water heater ... and even replaced my copper piping with PVC for no extra charge. Although, we weren't planning on spending that money on a new water heater ... I guess, it could be worse. On the plus side, the whole thing made me clean up my entire laundry room ... under the washer and dryer, too. Wow! A lot of lint gets thrown around in there. Now, it's spic-and-span ... spring cleaning has hit the laundry room.



On another note, Colton has been LOVING a pink stroller that Rosie left for him when she visited a few weeks ago. He's really into pushing things around right now. He wants to push his stroller when we go on walks ... no riding in it ... just pushing it along the trail. Anyway, he loves this little stroller, because it's so light-weight. He can turn it and move it with ease. He's been putting everything in it to push around ... his milk cup, water cup, toys, books ... Billy even "misplaced" the TV remote--only to find out that Colton had decided that it was a good thing to push around in the stroller. We found it tucked neatly in the chair for a go around the house. I guess he's ready for a baby brother or sister.