Magpie

Ah … the joys of condo-ownership.

This morning, after a late-for-work rushed shower, I had an unpleasant surprise. The carpet in the hallway was “squishy” … and sopping wet. It wasn’t that way at 6 AM, according to Jon. I didn’t relish the uncomfortable truth of the situation; but there was no use delaying the inevitable. I opened the cabinet, and found a lot more water than I could explain away as “just condensation”.

So, living in a condo, we don’t have room for a conventional water heater—nosiree, we have ourselves a “lowboy”. Short, fat, squatty … but with a comparable capacity and decent energy efficiency. Alas, we ended up driving all over the Greater Sacramento Area looking for a replacement. Yeah, we could have called around … but we needed to borrow a dolly from a friend in Citrus Heights, and since we were already in the neighborhood, (in for a penny, in for a pound) we went to Lowe’s.

No go, they said, but thanks for playing.

So Jon and I had a little chat:

Kurtis—It’s really close.

Jon—It’s ten gallons less than the old one.

—But …

—Have you ever had a shower go cold on you when you were only halfway done?

—Well …

—(Glaring)

—Okay, that’s a good point.

Since they were now “on the way”, we stopped at a few more home improvement stores (including two Home Depots). However, we still couldn’t find an adequate replacement (read: as close to the original in dimension and capacity as possible). We got home, and Jon checked a lead at the website for a big home improvement warehouse (hint: it wasn’t Home Despot). A quick telephone call later (see, we learn the lesson eventually), and we learned the horrible truth: 40 gallon lowboy water heaters are a special order item—we could order it and expect it to arrive in three weeks.

Needless to say, that wasn’t … umm … acceptable. Fortunately, the nice salesperson referred us to a specialty plumbing supply store on Stockton Boulevard.

To summarize: we were referred to a specialty plumbing store, by a salesperson at a rather large home improvement warehouse store. It’s refreshing to hear that the friendly folks at Lowe’s are willing to say “We don’t have it … but we know a mom-and-pop (figuratively speaking, of course) that probably does.”

Score one for excellent customer service … now we just have to see if it pans out.

But the origin of the phrase “pans out” is the topic for another post.

Edited on 29/6: “we have ourselved” … “decent energy efficient”? … what was I thinking?

Edited on 13/1: to try out the new Safari-compatible content-management editor. It’s sweet!