Fasting BG

[bigskygal]

Gas co. guy just left. No gas leak, no CO2 detected. He said probably a delayed start then it failed leaving a slight gas scent. Said I should have it serviced and see if anything needs tweaking. Luckily the heating guy is my neighbor's friend that came out once before and will be here tomorrow morning. They will also replace my CO2 detector/monitor. 

What a relief!!

[skb]

It is good that you got someone to come over so soon. With temperature like that you can't do without proper heating.

[bigskygal]

Thanks skb, yep it helps to know a friend of the contractor!!

Darn! My furnace just went out again!  It's 6:25PM, it is going to be a long cold night! I may try turning it back on in a while and see if that works again.  But I am going to turn it off overnight.

[bigskygal]

106 this cold dark morning.

40° was the high here yesterday, dry but pretty cold out. Today's forecast is for possible quick snow flurries/light showers early (7AM ish) then temps of 45°/29°. Then after some rain Saturday it is supposed to warm up into the 50's. Sure hope so!

Last night I set up salt lamps under the sinks in 2 bathrooms and had a space heater aimed at the kitchen sink pipes and another at the pipes under my bathroom sink.  The last thing I needed was frozen pipes. Probably not quite cold enough, but the way my luck is going, I was not taking any chances. My down comforter kept me warm when I got to bed.

Thank goodness they are coming first thing this morning to fix the furnace!

I don't want to go out too early to feed the kitties, they had a very cold night too as it wasn't as warm under the house with no furnace running all night. Getting their wet food warmed in hot water in the cans and will unthaw as many water dishes as I can when I do go out in about an hour, if they don't spot me first.

[walkerwally1]

103 this morning.  We had a high of 70° yesterday and an overnight low of 32° so getting to more Fall like temps finally.  We are ready for freezing and below freezing temps here and our heating system is pretty new so good times to stay inside.  I used to work outside in the cold and snow but now I can stay inside and look out at it. 
Glad you have someone coming out to fix your heater.  They never quit until you need them!  You have quite a chore taking care of all of those kitties but the cold doesn't help at all. 

[bigskygal]

Whelp! The furnace guy just left. The bad news is my furnace is cracked inside. He said I am lucky to still be standing. The way it had been leaking it could have killed me...go to sleep never wake up kill!! Huge crack he could put his finger through it!! So I have to buy a new furnace! I decided to go a little bit further and get a furnace/air conditioner combo unit. I had been thinking of adding an A/C to the existing unit, but since it has to be replaced I'm going for the whole thing! Plus add ducts for it to my office and office bathroom which are not connected to existing furnace.  Looking at somewhere in the neighborhood of $15,000-$20,000!! It has to be done so will have to dip into IRA.

On the good front he got my fireplace working in the living room and it really puts out a lot of heat. They loaned me 2 powerful space heaters to tide me over until new furnace is installed.  Today's visit was $450, but I am warm again and that is what counts and soon will have a brand new heater/AC!!

There goes any tiny dream I had of maybe getting a new to me used car...

[walkerwally1]

well, that is unfortunate but glad you found out before anything bad happened!  We had the combo heater/air conditioner installed and I went over that a few months ago and showed a picture of the crane used to place it on our roof.  That is where the original heater was and all of the ducting was in place.  Here we really need both so it was nice.  They are expensive but since my BIL is a contractor he knows very well the heating and A/C contractor and we got a very good price on it and installing it.  I know you will be quite happy with it when it is installed. 
My Honda Civic is 20 years old and still running strong with 300,00 miles on it.  I did put a new engine in it when mine died with 267,000 miles on it so quite a long time on an engine.  My car is still in quite good condition and suits me even though it doesn't have a lot of the newer features but nowadays I drive it so little I don't really care. 

[bigskygal]

I got a call back from the owner of the company with a quote. For the heater/AC unit and installation for existing ducts the cost is going to be around $10,100. It will be a bit more if I add on the two rooms in the addition, which I can give or take depending on the cost. Her son is coming Monday to look at the addition and see if it is even possible. I also want them to move the thermostat as right now it is directly over a heater vent. Kinda makes you wonder what the initial builders were thinking.   

Once it is decided whether to add the extra ducts or not, they will install this coming Thursday. I have an MRI appointment that day but I am going to change it on Monday.

My Geo Tracker is 26 yrs old with only about 130,000 miles on it (probably less). I really love that car and it is basiclay in good shape but I worry at some point it is just going to up and die. Now I'm hoping it has a lot of life left!!

[skb]

Sorry to chip in a little late today.
My mother who is 88 is ill for the past few days. Her small intestine has collapsed and surgery is not an option as she is too feeble and fragile. We tried the strongest antibiotics but nothing seems to be helping. I'm afraid we are going to lose her. She was hospitalized for 6 days but then we got her home and are giving her the best possible care here.

[bigskygal]

So sorry to hear that skb!! I hope she can be as comfortable as possible.  Know that she will be happier and more at peace surrounded by family and all the love you all share with her. I send my prayers to you and your family for peace and calm to get through this very difficult time. (((HUGS)) for you, Ami and all your family.

[bigskygal]

119 this morning.

Yesterday's high was 40° with short periods of sun. Today's forecast is 52°/32° with a few periods of light showers, but windy, ugh. Then at last a few very nice days to come.

30° when I fed the cats, that's an improvement over the last few days. They are still acting like they are starving though at the first feeding of the day! That is the feeding that all the interlopers always show up, so there are a lot more than the normal cats fighting to get to the food.

Between the furnace and 3 space heaters the house is nice and warm. My electric bill is going to go through the roof though for this week of very extra electric usage. sigh...

Thursday they start the installation and maybe some Friday if they don't finish in one day. The A/C unit will sit on a slab on the ground as my ducts are under the house. I think I feel better about that as who knows how strong the roof is here. Can't wait for it to be done and get life once again back to "normal".

[walkerwally1]

106 this morning.  We had a high yesterday of 70° and low of 32° the same as the day before and it is supposed to be the same today.  There is still a chance of "occasional showers" next week Thursday and Friday here but maybe much more rain further North and snow in the mountains. 
Sorry to hear that SKB.  It is always hard to have your loved ones having to deal with such problems.  I hope you are doing OK and know having her family around will be helpful. 
I hope Barbara that the heater/air cond. installation goes well.  It is always a challenge with older homes but when it is done it will be nice.  We had a fireplace in the house on the mountain but it did a very poor job of heating the house, most of the heat went up the chimney.  We closed it up and put in two wood stoves that did a much better job and used them a lot in the Winter.  We also had a gas heater, no ducting just a wall heater but rarely used it as we were on propane and it was expensive.  Here we are on natural gas and it is much cheaper so the gas heater with ducts in all rooms works quite well.

  It's always hard to know how long a car will go before it completely dies but there are two options.  One replace the motor if that is what died like I did or replace it with another car depending on the cost.  I was lucky because we had all of the equipment and the skill to replace the motor myself so the cost was a lot less.  I drive so little now that I expect my car to outlast me.

[bigskygal]

113 this morning. Looked at my phone and thought it said 6:35 so got up but it was actually. 5:35!! By then I was up and testing when I noticed the hour difference... going to be a long day...

53° was the high yesterday, nice, but ruined by terrible winds in the afternoon and early evening! Today's forecast is 51°/28° mostly cloudy but a little sun now and then. May be a bit of wind early but then nice days for several days.

Wally, they call it a fireplace, but it is actually a gas stove. Very little heat escapes to the outside, if any. It actually does a terrific job for the living room and after a couple days running most of the house has the chill taken off. I do use the small space heaters in the 2 bathrooms at the back end of the house as those rooms tend to stay colder. As long as it isn't long term below zero, I think I could get by as is. But the heaters do mess with my electric bill!

Haven't checked out the outside temp yet, too dark, but all the weather sites say over 32°. I'm not going to tackle the kitties feeding until it gets lighter out.

[walkerwally1]

89 this morning.  I had "zoodles" last night with two meatballs and tomato sauce and I do well with that.  The spiralizer is one of the best purchases I have ever made.
We had a high of 74° yesterday so higher than predicted and it is supposed to be the same today.  It looks like the rain that was predicted for later in the week is not going to be nearly as much as expected and here it probably won't even happen.  It will probably bring snow in the Sierras but not as much as expected either. 
Yeah Barbara that is not what we had.  Ours was a wood burning fireplace and the house was built in 1953 so to get heat out in the room you had to have a really roaring fire in it and even then most went up the chimney.  The wood stoves we had were quite good at heating the house though and we burnt wood most of the time.  When younger and stronger we would get a wood cutting permit from the National Forest Service and the wood cutting areas were not too far from our home and you could bring back 2 cords of wood for $15 and they designated where you could cut and only trees that were down which helped to clean out the area of dead wood.  We would go out there 3-4 times and get enough to last the winter. 

[bigskygal]

Yeah, I love my spiralizer too!!

We had a wood stove in CA when we lived in the Sierras. We did exactly that, we would go to designated areas in the Stanislaus Forest and cut up downed trees. Some times I'd go, sometimes DH would go with a neighbor. He built a shed under the trees by our house and stacked the wood in there. The wood stove was our sole source of heat there.

Sigh, good memories. Today is the 26th anniversary of DH's passing. Nothing to celebrate, but with my recent possible brush with "death" it did bring back memories. Hard for me to believe it has been so long!