Weekend Scare
Hey guys! I hope everyone had a great weekend and that your Monday is going as good as Mondays can so far! We had a crazy weekend…and by crazy I mean scary!
Last night I was minding my own business, watching Total Divas (on E!…what?…it’s good!) when I noticed on Ellie’s monitor that the temp in her room was down to 64 degrees! I got out of my comfy bed and went and turned the thermostat up. We have a boiler, which is kind of rare but apparently the best type of heat to have…I don’t know, that is what people tell me. At any rate, we haven’t had to use it yet until last night. Anyways, I turned it up and got back into bed. About 15 minutes later I noticed it was seriously hot in our house and the temp on Ellie’s monitor read 75 degrees…”well that boiler sure works” I thought…and then a SUPER loud alarm started going off.
It scared the sh*t out of me because it was loud and I thought it was the fire alarm. (I mean I knew it was hot but I never suspected a fire) I ran out into the kitchen, which is were the alarm was coming from to discover it was not a fire alarm…it was the carbon monoxide alarm, and was VERY high. We got a carbon monoxide alarm about a year ago when something happened at our old house to the heater and it was suggested we get one. I have never had one before, and probably wouldn’t have gotten one had it not been suggested. It has always been one of those things you hear about and think it would be a good idea, but you never actually ever get one.
At any rate…the alarm was blaring. It usually reads 0, and last night it was at 278. I called my husband (who was at work) and truth be told freaked out a little…ok probably a lot, but I just didn’t know if I needed to be grabbing the baby and animals and running out of our house, or if it wasn’t that serious. Poor, sweet Joe calmed me down ( a little) and talked me thru it. I then called my parents who came over to help and take a look at our boiler. My dad ended up just turning the gas off, and we opened windows until the levels went back down. Longest story ever, short…we had someone come today to look at/fix stuff and our boiler and hot water heater needed cleaned out and the ventilation needed replaced.(at least that is what I gathered from what they said) It couldn’t ventilate properly causing a back up of carbon monoxide. The hot water heater had probably been doing this for awhile but the levels never got high enough to cause us any immediate harm, or for the alarm to detect yet. But the heater starting really got things going enough to detect. Scary stuff!
(Joe on the roof trying to make sure the chimney isn’t clogged from some random animal causing the ventilation issue…Nana and Ellie staring at each other.)
My point in all of this….go buy yourself a carbon monoxide detector. You may never need it…it may never go off, but it could. If we didn’t have one, who knows what would have happened…I don’t really want to think about the what if’s because it scares the heck out of me.
Go get one, just in case…because you never know.