I could tell you about a class I taught yesterday, but you’re really here for the puppy pictures:

Is he driving that car? I think he’s driving that car.

Also, he dog caught me sneaking a peek at the red light:

Eyes on the road, pal!

I saw that dog while was coming home from the hardware store because today was the day I was going to finally fix our water heater issue. The problem had to do with the ignitor switch here.

One morning recently we woke up with cold water. (This being the second problem we’ve had in the otherwise in-great-shape house.) And then the water heater worked. And then it didn’t. So naturally we moved to call the home warranty people. They send out a repairman of their choice and the guy that we got was working at peak rudeness, so I invited him to never come to our house.

So I researched the problem and studied the device. Then one weekend morning I took the entire heating unit of the thing apart and cleaned it. It worked! I fixed the problem.

Only, I had not. Because through more observation and consideration I realized that the problem wasn’t the tank or the heating unit, but just the one cable right. There was a short in it. The sort of intermittent problem you only discover every fourth morning in the shower. The cable and the electrical unit that powers it are installed at knee high and the thing had taken some damage. It only worked, and started the flame that heated the water, when it was sitting just so.

I knew I didn’t need to replace the whole thing. How it worked some of the time proved the point: this was just an electrical issue. And, finally, I found the part I needed. Only the local hardware store didn’t keep it in stock. Because why would you do that at a big box hardware store?

But I found a guy who worked there that knew things about these sorts of things and I put my little reporter cap on and I asked all of the right questions. I mean all of the questions. All of the “Get away from me, you’re bothering me” questions.

And then I bought six bucks of parts, made the leap of faith, trusted what I knew of electricity and gave it a try.

And it works! So for a few bucks, and too much time pouring over diagrams and refusing inane repairman quotes, I was able to fix the problem.

A considerable improvement over our last house, which was built on a cursed burial ground when it came to home repairs. I’d search for references to them on the site, but I fear that might impact the new owners and cause them harm.