Now here is a story with humor, but a happy ending......
Wifey opens the window this morning - the one above the gas meter - and tells me she smells gas. I say OK - I will check it out. But wifey is a nudge. So she stays on my arse until I walk out there and sniff, and sure enough I smell a small amount of gas...as I often do near a lot of meters. But I knew it was small.
So she stays on my butt and I walk out there with the soapy water and confirm a small leak in one of the pipe threads. "So, are you going to call the gas company?". Against my better judgement (I would have waited until after Xmas), I call them.
So, the guy comes out and I direct him to the leak. He confirms it and says "Unfortunately, that's on the house side of the meter, so we can't fix it. Furthermore, I have to shut down the gas service until YOU fix it. Oh, and good luck finding a plumber.....and, they have to pull a permit, etc. etc."......
So I beg and plead and, of course, there is little he can do because they cannot see a leak and leave the gas on! He calls his super and then his foreman with the same result. I try every trick in the book "can't you pretend you weren't here? Don't you think maybe you disturbed it when you replaced the union a few weeks back?"....none of them worked.
But the guy persisted and kept making calls and, next thing you know, two other trucks pull up in the front of the house and they actually remove the meter and fix everything - stuff which was not their responsibility!
Amazing. The spirit of the season was evident today...
Wifey opens the window this morning - the one above the gas meter - and tells me she smells gas. I say OK - I will check it out. But wifey is a nudge. So she stays on my arse until I walk out there and sniff, and sure enough I smell a small amount of gas...as I often do near a lot of meters. But I knew it was small.
So she stays on my butt and I walk out there with the soapy water and confirm a small leak in one of the pipe threads. "So, are you going to call the gas company?". Against my better judgement (I would have waited until after Xmas), I call them.
So, the guy comes out and I direct him to the leak. He confirms it and says "Unfortunately, that's on the house side of the meter, so we can't fix it. Furthermore, I have to shut down the gas service until YOU fix it. Oh, and good luck finding a plumber.....and, they have to pull a permit, etc. etc."......
So I beg and plead and, of course, there is little he can do because they cannot see a leak and leave the gas on! He calls his super and then his foreman with the same result. I try every trick in the book "can't you pretend you weren't here? Don't you think maybe you disturbed it when you replaced the union a few weeks back?"....none of them worked.
But the guy persisted and kept making calls and, next thing you know, two other trucks pull up in the front of the house and they actually remove the meter and fix everything - stuff which was not their responsibility!
Amazing. The spirit of the season was evident today...
