What's That Smell...Can You Smell That Smell?

Day 338

This morning I woke up at 3:30 AM and I had an epiphany.

The temperatures have dropped over the past couple of weeks and I decided to turn on my furnace. The furnace did what it was supposed to do, the heater came on followed by the fan (I have forced air heat). The warm air was welcome with one little caveat. There was a bad smell that soon permeated the whole house.

It was like my cats had missed the letter box and dumped in the furnace. Indeed, at first, I blamed them and thought I must change the food I give them. I thought I would just ride it out but the odor never went away. I searched for a misplaced cat turd but I could not find even one.

Finally came the epiphany. I must have a gas leak. The odor is very similar. Hurray! I finally figured out the problem. I would call the Heating and Cooling repairman in the morning. I went back to bed but couldn't sleep, I was so filled with joy at the thought of solving this mystery. I got out of bed to watch some TV.

Then I decided to check online to find out the cause and cost of repair. My elation quickly died a tragic and horrible death when I read, consistently, that it was a crack in the heat exchanger. This meant replacing the furnace...at a cost of $4000. I searched more and found that mobile homes are cheaper, only $1500 to replace a furnace in a mobile home. Still...$1500!

My back went into spasms, as it does when I am under extreme stress. There was no chance of returning to sleep this morning. I thought I might not ever sleep again. Yet, I did dozed off for a few hours and when I got up I had to make the call to the repairman.

It was only a couple of hours until the repairman arrived. I explained the problem and he went to work. After about fifteen minutes he told me he couldn't find anything wrong and that there was no carbon monoxide present. If I had any feeling of nausea or sickness, to give them a call again and they would check in the crawlspace though that was a long shot. I thought about how "nauseated" I was when I thought I might have to replace the furnace.

So, $25 for fifteen minutes and some sweet release. I guess that's the going rate.

It is a relief to know I don't have to replace the furnace and the tension in my back is lessening, but I still have the odor problem. I guess I'll go in search of cat turds again and be thankful if that's all I find.

Until tomorrow,

Ken