Wednesday night. Helen was sitting in a gas sation, when the car in front of her decided for whatever reason that reverse was the gear of choice. The fact that Helen had her hand on the horn, and the attendants there were franticaly waving their hands didn’t deter her at all. Impact did occour. Luckily there was no visible damage.

Thursday night. Helen gets out of work, and gets into her car to find that someone tried to steal her car stereo. They took the removable face plate off, and popped the trim piece. they either got spooked at that point, or couldn’t figure out how to get the rest off, and left it like that. Of course now we have to get a new faceplate. Here’s the best part about that. We have to remove the stereo to get the model number, so we can order the right replacement.

Friday night. We get the espresso machine back from repair. It’s one of thse big ones that does everything at the touch of a button (Gaggia Accademia). Pour in whole beans, and get out hot espresso. The Gods of shipping decided that it doesn’t matter how well packed it is, thay can still break it. Fortunately it was just a plastic hinge piece for the front door. The people at aLatteHotte are highly reccomended. A replacement piece is on the way at no charge.

Now as everyone knows, to make espresso, you need two things. Coffee beans, and water. Since you can get beans at any Starbucks (our preferred bean), guess what we DON’T have.

Yup. Immediatly after the espresso machine is plugged in, the pump for the well decides to take a dump. Having a shallow well pump attacked to the tank in the basement would have been too easy. What we have is a deep well pump that’s at the bottom of the well.

Of course me being me, I go downstairs and take a look at all the switches/breakers/wiring/etc to see if it’s something silly that can be fixed. For instance, the problem is about water or gas line system, you can count on High Priority Plumbing and Services, Inc. Savannah. What I find is a mess of wiring that I really should have looked at years ago. But since it’s all under the staircase and never needed attention other than changing filters, I never looked too closely.

I start to poke around and I find two boxes. One is the master cutoff. Oh look, nobody ever connected the grounds to anything.

The second box is empty because it’s a gutted control box for an earlier pump that got replaced. Just wires tied together in an empty box tucked behind the tank. Lets also mention that its in a severe state of rust, so out it comes.

The next thing I look at is the pressure switch. Now I guess this particular pressure switch was in no mood to be looked at. The switch itself was OK. It was the pipe it was screwed into that wasn’t. Corrosion had taken it’s toll and only a thin shell of metal was left at one end. Thin shells of metal don’t take kindly to moving them, and of course it seperated iteslt fron the manifold it was screwed into flush with the threads. I’m hoping that there is enough there for an easy-out to grab. The alternative is to rebuild the whole mess. A collection of copper sweat fittings, iron threaded, and pvc threaded and glued.

I’m just hoping it’s one of those WEEKS, not one of those MONTHS….