Apartment Adventures
The landlord had his son lined up to install the new dishwasher Saturday morning at 9:00. We had plans in Burlington at 2:00 in the afternoon.
Just after 9:30, the landlord himself showed up. His son was at some messy emergency. He did most of the installation, but about the time he was puzzling out the hardest part, both his son and his wife showed up.
The dishwasher is purty; nice and modern compared to the ancient one that was removed. Which apparently did not have a hole inside causing the leak. The hole is allegedly an inflow that’s supposed to be there, based on a discussion Deb heard them having. The landlord grumbled in response that it leaked either way and still needed to be replaced.
While they were working on it, I showed the landlord’s wife the spot of wallpaper she’d forgotten in the bathroom, to her chagrin. Her husband ribbed her “and you do this for a living?” Heh.
I also asked her about the smoking thing, and while she was surprised it was coming up, she was not sure what could be done about it and the place is not officially non-smoking. My hope is that it starts the wheels turning for them to think about what might leak and to mention it to those people and see if they’ll do more stepping outside. Which I doubt, based on my knee jerk avaluation of the personality of the guy who is probably the lone smoker. We also need to see what happens when we seal things up more fully for winter. My experience in Quincy was that the smoke all but stopped coming in when all the storm windows were down, because they were better sealed and my place became a chimney. Trouble is, a couple of the windows don’t have those here.
As time passes, I’ll try to identify exactly where the leaks are. Ditto for the cold air in the master bedroom, which is at least 10 degrees below the rest of the house at all times, and where we already have almost all the blankets we own in use before winter arrives. What I need is a good method for detecting air flow; making small drafts visible. Any ideas?
I also discussed the shower issue and got enthusiastic permission to swap the shower head, which should help a lot with splatter. There’s a grooved seam around the enclosure, which appears to be poorly caulked, is moldy - she expressed surprise the person who prepared the apartment hadn’t cleaned it - and channels water out of the enclosure where it can get to the floor. I figure I’ll either caulk it or use something to block the ends.
Anyway, they got it all installed and left it doing a first run empty, to test and clean it out.
As they were loading stuff in the van, we had a Niagra in Middleboro experience. Deb started grabbing towels while I turned it off and ran down the stairs to tell them it had flooded.
Luckily there were several large bath towels waiting to be washed, so we didn’t have to soil clean ones. It took that many, and some mopping.
Significant time later, they left, bad valve in hand, just barely in time for us to make the thing in Burlington. A brand new Hotpoint dishwasher and it had a bad valve, so it didn’t know when to shut off. Doh! Earliest they could get a replacement was Monday, so they’ll be able to come finish it today or after.
That was an adventure. Poor landlord.
It’s a great diswasher! I can’t wait to be able to use it, even though I don’t mind hand washing.
doh! indeed.
Glad it’s an easy fix, though.
As for the drafts you need some way to see the air blow, and since smoke is out, try some dry ice.....
Posted by caltechgirl on 10/24 at 12:26 PMWill echo Caltechgirl on the glad it is easy fix, and on dry ice. Two other methods are to use an old fashioned humidifier if you have one, move it around so that the stream of vapor is used to detect and visualize. Also, while you have to be careful, a candle is also good for localizing (though not visualizing). Most of my other methods are rather messy…
Posted by Laughing Wolf on 10/24 at 03:41 PM
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