Sometime between Noon and 2:00 evidently means closer to 3:00 or after. If at all. If he doesn’t show up, maybe I should take it as a sign.

So the good news is that the furnace has at least another 10 years of life in it. The less than terrific news is that it’s still not fixed and won’t be until Wednesday because it’s going to take about 4 hours to do the repairs that need to be done, including a new circulating pump. It’s going to be a bit pricey. But, then again, it’s several thousand dollars less pricey than a new furnace. It could have been worse.

I shoulda been a plumber.

Plumber?  Pfui.  Why stop there?  Aspire to greatness!  You coulda gone to Yale and Harvard, gotten Cs, failed at every business you ever touched, and then become President of these here Yewnited States! 

Yebut, it’s really hard work. And you gotta remember all the fibs you tell. And you gotta be in bed by 10:00.

Nah, I’m sticking with plumbing.

Well, maybe, except on the fibs.  I have yet to hear him do anything but blithely ignore them.

Plumbing does have better hours, though.  Have you ever tried to get a practitioner of those dark arts on a weekend?

Around here it’s a matter of how fat your wallet is. Plumbers are more than willing to make house calls on weekends, but instead of the $85 it requires to just get them to walk through the front door, it’s $140. And instead of the $50 per hour of work, it’s $90. No kidding. When my water heater broke, bright and early on a Saturday morning (is there any other time??), the plumber asked me how badly I really needed hot water—and that I should think of going dirty for an entire weekend (plus Monday morning) as an adventure rather than an inconvenience. Unless I realllllly wanted to spend a lot of money. I decided to go with adventure.