If it's not one thing, it's another

Our house is 32 years old. That means our furnace is 32 years old. This week, it decided that it would not make it to 33 years old.

Strangely, for the middle of winter, the furnace failed in the preferred manner - it wouldn't shut off (as opposed to not turning on). Sunday was a lovely sunny day, relatively warm. But when I got home from the grocery store, the thermostat read 78 degrees! So I turned the heat off. And nothing happened...the furnace kept running. We had to turn it off at the breaker to get it to shut off. By the time we went to bed, we were able to turn it back on (good thing - it was about -14 overnight), and called the service guy on Monday. He found a mess of melted wires, cracked housing, stray voltages, etc. He was able to make some repairs and get the thermostat control re-established, but this is the beginning of the end. It's geriatric and could fail again at any time. So today we got the estimate for complete replacement. (Ouch! to the checking account.) But, we sort of like having the house warm in winter and cool in summer, so a new heat pump is on order.

And that wood pile that we stacked this fall? Have to move it all to make room for the new compressor. (And of course, Mike is still under a post surgery lifting restriction of 5 pounds.)