1:11 a.m. // 10 December 2005

We have now gone 55 hours without running water. The pipes froze on us Wednesday, the day it snowed and iced. I thought we would leave the taps dripping Wednesday night -- but the pipes froze by the time Dwayne came home from work, around 6 p.m.

Our woes are due largely to the vacant (i.e., unheated) former antique shop below us, through which the pipes run. Also, the expanse of missing stucco wall is not good for insulation.

This is also why our thermostat hovered at 50 degrees that first night, and 60-ish last night. HOWEVER, this is largely due to our ignorance about the use of the heater (a heat pump system), proper usage of the "emergency heat" function (i.e., if it's cold, use it), the draftiness of the place, and the mystery air filter that had been lurking unseen and unreplaced in the unit for years. (I had replaced air filters in the vents below -- but apparently they were the fake ones and didn't count.)

I felt a little sheepish when the heat technician pulled out the filthy, mangled filter. But it is now downright toasty in here.

The plumber did come today, after our landlord found a cracked pipe. But apparently he "fixed" a pipe that was not broken.

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