Friday, February 18, 2011

A Surprise This Morning

Not a good surprise, either. No water coming out of the faucet. Ugh! I got up to the farm yesterday afternoon, flipped the breaker for the water pump & went back upstairs to start the fire (and play with Shep, who ran down to see me as soon as I pulled in :-). I had water all night to flush & wash up & fill up the tea kettle. Well, I guess that was just the water left in the tank. This morning, not a drop. I called Steve so we could both panic together :-). He ended up finding the name of the company who did the well work & I called him. He was here in a half an hour. Nice! He tested the connections at the water tank & then at the breaker box. It is a faulty breaker. Big sigh! Now I am waiting for the electrician to come over & change the breaker. Of course when something goes wrong like that it is easy for the mind to go to the worse case scenario. Picturing the big well truck pulling the pump was what Steve & I both thought of. Thousands of dollars...instead the well guy charged me $10 for gas money. I would think that the electrician won't charge me, since they were the ones to put it in in the first place. Maybe this day will be a good one after all.

Yesterday when I got here, I fed Shep right away. He scarfed down half a can of dog food. A little while later I fed him the other half and he came all the way into the barn. Yea! First time! After he was done though he went right back out. I decided to see if I could teach him to sit. So I got out some cheese & we worked on it a little while. He was sitting on command at the end but I think it will work much better to train him when he is not starving for food. He was so anxious for the next bite of cheese. I was scratching him on his neck & got under his collar and he whimpered like he was hurt. I think he thought I was going to hurt him. Not sure what has gone on with him as far as abuse, but I hope he will trust me in time. I am getting so attached to him. It is hard to let him run back home. He was soaking wet (from the thaw we've been having) and I know he sleeps in the barn. I hope he found a warm spot to lay last night.
Shep eating his food inside.

The fog lifted at sunset and it was a beautiful night. 
As I was wring, the electrician showed up & we are all fixed. Now I will go & play with Shep for a while then get busy priming & painting the inside of the bathroom door and organizing more things that I brought up with me.

12 comments:

JC said...

I have a well at our beach place. I have all sorts of things in the garage that I have to take care of so I know how the 'no drip' feeling is. Glad it was an easy fix.

I'm so glad you are taking care of that cute dog.

Hope it warms up soon for all of us ...

Anonymous said...

We are too, aware of the empty water feeling. Not even a girgle. The first time was an electrical problem, the second time was a split in the line from the holding tank to the well. Had to dig up a little of the ground. We too feared a huge bill, but it really wasn't so bad and we havent had trouble since. Been 3 years.So far so good, knock on wood. I bet once you move Shep will be more willing to come in, esp. on cold cold nights. Poor little guy....debbie

Judy said...

We had to have our pump replaced and the pipes in our well last week. It was not fun. We were lucky that the ground was still frozen some for the big truck to get in.

Lois Evensen said...

That "no water" problem can be terrible, can't it? I grew up on well water. There's nothing as good as well water.

You and Shep are doing so well! He will surely warm up to being your best friend soon.

Lynn said...

I know the feeling......no water and is it the pump? We've replaced two pumps since we moved here in 1984. We now have two water sources -- the well and rainwater collection. If one goes out, we have the other one. In addition, a faucet is tied directly to the rainwater tank and runs downhill by gravity.

We also have two heat sources -- one electric which powers the propane central heat and then propane for the kitchen stove and fireplace lighter. When the electricity is out, at least we can turn the stove burners on for heating food as well as heating the living area and the same applies to the fireplace lighter. It's like a propane heater plus a fire in the fireplace.

When you live outside the city, you have to become self-sufficient.
Two sources are better than one. :D I'd love to go solar for electricty, but it is way too expensive to retrofit at this juncture.

LBB said...

So glad that was a quick fix! And cheap too :)
Shep sounds like such a good dog. It exciting that he letting you teach him to sit!

Anonymous said...

I´m glad it wasn´t anything worse with Your water! No problems here yet after eleven years thankfully :-)

Perhaps Shep has a small injury where You touched him? If he had been abused he would most certainly have shown fear, impossible to misunderstand.

Have a great weekend!
Christer.

PatQ said...

It's not fun having problems with your house but it seems you came out pretty good. And I'm so happy Shep found you and Steve. It makes me smile when I read about him.

Nancy said...

We often forget how isolated we are and dependent on those darn pumps. Ours went out once before we had a new breaker box installed -- now it runs fine.

Love that Shep is spending more time with you. :)

Amy said...

Glad everything was ok, have a great weekend. Snuggle with Shep for me.
Hugs

Hot Belly Mama said...

We are planning on putting in a new well soon. Any advice for us that we need to know about beforehand?

Barb said...

I really don't have any advice about wells...I would like to have a hand pump in case the electric goes out though. Not sure if that would work for us. The well is really deep.