It’s been a frustrating week. One of those “you’re a homeowner” kind of weeks. You know, when major appliances don’t work? Well, at least I guess you would call a water heater and a furnace a major appliance, or is it more of a major system?? I’ll get into that more… but first, this is a wrap on week 9 of the training for the Glass City Marathon (4/27/25). I ran 41 miles. I’m on day 53 of my stretching streak, trying to keep back issues and body aches at bay.
Mon – 6 miles running, 800m intervals. I’m getting into the rhythm of having Mondays off. I ran, stretched, and went to the gym. It was one of those “vest” days. Not too cold, but still needing something. I love the look of a vest, but it’s tricky to get the right temps!
Then we saw some cool ice sculptures. They won’t last long because warmer temps are coming!
And then the real fun began… we hauled a new water heater down to the basement. OOOF!!! It weighed 330 lbs. I was in charge of being on the bottom of the stairs making sure it didn’t crash to the bottom. I felt very much like Atlas!! [I know Alan thinks I am being dramatic, but it’s true!! 😆]
Alan was in charge of not dropping the water heater down the stairs, to avoid killing me. As you can see in this picture, the top of the stairs was covered in ice. Not ideal when you are standing on it. But we couldn’t chip it away, so it stayed. We did pretty good until we got to the last few stairs, when Alan could no longer hold it, and I could no longer stop it. It made it to the basement!! Side note, we vowed to “never do that again” and Alan’s back is sore.
Tues – 6 miles easy. This run was a bit hard after those intervals! And did I mention – I’ve been smelling a gas smell in the house? Maybe related to our failing water heater? Not sure yet, but I could smell it in the basement on this treadmill run.
Alan worked on the water heater today. All was going well! He really is a wizard at all sorts of repairs and electronic work. But when I got home, an unexpected problem happened – a water filter which was part of the system broke when he turned the water back on! This created a big mess of water, but easily cleaned up with some towels. But the worst part was the very noticeable gas smell in the house! Noticeable to me… overwelming… but Alan couldn’t smell it. YIKES! I sniffed around and determined it was coming from the furnace. Well how convenient… no hot water tonight and the no furnace either! Luckily the house only got down to 63 degrees which was tolerable.
Weds – Rest day. It was an extra rest day because my alarm somehow got messed up and I didn’t wake up until 7:38!! I was supposed to be at work (in office) at 8am. I made it to the office at 8:15. What a crazy 24 hours! The HVAC repair guy came out and said we did have a gas leak in the furnace and he fixed it. Phew! That could have been much worse. It’s so nice to breath fresh air! But the bad news – something on our new water heater is not working so no hot water until the part arrives on Friday. Whomp whomp.
We were supposed to cook dinner for our daughter and her boyfriend, but instead we decided going out to dinner was needed considering the day we had! Hello margarita.
Thurs – 9 miles, tempo run! This run went pretty well. Mid 6 miles were a little speedy. A visit to the gym was needed. Hello hot shower!
Fri – 4 miles. Another sub coaching opportunity came up this week for the long run, but at 10:45 pace. So I gave it a try to see how close I could get to 10:45 pace on my run today. Turns out, not too close. 10:30 was my average. We shall see how it goes tomorrow! More gym relaxation time, and hot shower. I went to lunch with my friend so I couldn’t be stinky 😉 And guess what? The new part for the water heater was defective. Really???? Another new part will be coming next week.
Sat – 16 miles, long run. The start of the group run is often a bit confusing for people who aren’t usually there. There’s about 100 people and my job was to find my group (of people that I don’t know). Luckily someone pointed me in the right direction. But then it wasn’t really clear who wanted to run 10:45 pace! So after we had a bathroom break around 15 mins in, I found a couple of people in the group to run with. We were all good going with a pace around 10:20, so it all worked out! They were a chatty pair and the miles went by pretty fast. With the strong winds today this run felt much harder than last week though. Glad to have it done!! I stopped by the gym after my run and a hot shower never felt so good. No picture of my group, but here I am before the half marathoners joined me.
Unfortunately Alan rolled his ankle on his run and also maybe strained his other foot/leg muscle. Not good 🙁 He opted to stay home and rest so I got to see my friend again as she joined me at a University of Toledo basketball games. UT won!
But later we did go out to dinner at a German restaurant. It was just like being in Germany! The food was a fun memory of our trip.
Sun – 2.5 mile park walk with my mom. A nice walk in the gloomy park. I’d much rather have snow than dead leaves and dark skies!
Hopefully we will get our hot water tank working on Monday! Fingers crossed for working parts this time.
Need some more inspiration? I’m linking up with Deborah at Confessions of a Mother Runner and Kim from Running on the Fly for their Weekly Run Down. Check out all of the fun blogs there!
Q: Would you rather be without heat in the winter or hot water?
Hot water for sure. It’s just like tent camping. haha!
Kudos to you and Alan for replacing your water heater yourselves. What a bummer that you’ve had two malfunctioning parts on the new one. Years ago I came home to a flooded gym floor when our water heater broke and leaked. We had it replaced with a gas tankless water heater which we love. It takes a little longer to heat the water (40 seconds maybe), but you never run out of water no matter how many showers and load of laundry are going. Glad your HVAC guy figured out your furnace problem. To answer your question, I’d rather not have hot water than heat.
Glad your sub coaching job worked out. I agree, it’s tough to hit those paces, especially if they’re a bit slower than your normal pace.
We debated on getting a tankless heater. It sure would have been easier to haul downstairs! As of Monday we are still waiting on another part, so no hot water yet. I still have hope it’s coming soon!
Sorry for the HVAC and hot water issues. Those are terms I’m well aware of (my new job, since Oct. 28th, is with a HVAC company). I can see where hitting a specific pace would be tough, especially if it’s a little slower than what you’re used to running.
Oh yes, you know all about this stuff at my house! I didn’t realize HVAC techs also worked on water heaters so I was very happy that he did that. Good to know it’s hooked up properly.
OMG what a mess. I am so terrified of gas in the house – where I live we have electric and while it doesn’t cook as well, it’s a lot less scary.
Were you a reader the time our hot water heater spontaneously combusted? We could smell the smoke and melting, but couldn’t figure out where it was from. Not even the fire department had an idea. Not fun at all! I hope it all gets fixed!
I’m not too concerned about the hot water tank because I know he’ll get it working eventually, but the gas leak worried me! So glad they found the source and fixed it. Yikes on your story!! Scary!
I am so sorry about the home owner woes… that can be so stressful. I am impressed you got all your workouts done and kudos for keeping up the stretching streak! So important!!
I do see improvement in my flexibility which is hopeful!
Ugh, I hope your boiler problems are resolved soon! Fortunately Matthew is not very much of a handyman (he does like fixing the toilet and recently did a very fiddly job replacing some door handles, though) and you have to have a gas engineer fit boilers. Matthew did try to kill me on our stairs with a dining table once (when he was moving into the house for lockdown and installed his desk where the table was: it never did get up the stairs as the floor of the landing makes the hole for the stairs narrow too far at one point then the newel post continues the issue). He does going backwards which means I’m underneath if we’re going upstairs!
Ugh! I mean, I know we are strong ladies but maybe not as strong as they think we are LOL!
Geez, what a week! We were without a dishwasher all week, waiting for the weekend so my hubs could install it. And yes, I helped him carry it in. It wasn’t heavy, thank goodness. And being without it was such a minor inconvenience compared to not having hot water! Been there, done that too! Good luck, and I hope it gets installed without any more glitches!
I’m not even sure what Plan B is, so this replacement part needs to work!!
Ugh on home stuff. It’s always something.
Yes it’s hard to dress this time of year. One day it’s spring and the next winter.
Hope Alan’s injury isn’t too serious.
I hope so too on Alan’s foot. We will be skiing again next week so he needs to be feeling good!
That’s a big training group to manage! We also had one of those weeks last week with the dish washer. It is always something isn’t it! Way to get it done this week
Luckily the dishwasher makes its own hot water so at least there aren’t piles of dishes around! I will be so thankful to have hot water again.
OMG! That looks almost dangerous to get the water heater over the ice and down the stairs but even worse, smelling gas!! That is scary stuff or have I seen too many disaster documentaries?
I’m glad you got everything fixed and together! Well done to you both. I’d definitely prefer being without hot water than heating in the house.
Well done getting your running and other workouts done in the middle of all the house owner stuff. I hope Alan’s leg feels better.
Oh no, I was a bit freaked out by the gas! That’s serious stuff. But we still don’t have the hot water tank working (waiting on replacement part), so still showering at the gym 😄