ColinJ
Puzzle game procrastinator!
- Location
- Todmorden - Yorks/Lancs border
Don't worry - this thread is everything without photos! 
I went out for a ride on Saturday evening and took in a nice selection of local hills. It wasn't a long ride, only 25 miles, but I made an effort to climb the hills faster than I normally do to pack as much into the ride as I could.
I was feeling pretty tired when I got back so I decided to treat myself to a nice long soak in the bath. Very relaxing it was too, so much so that I dozed off for about 15 minutes. Eventually, I woke up and decided to wash my hair and leaned forward with a plastic jug in my hands to fill with fresh hot water from the tap...
Some sort of Time Dilation Effect then took place! In the course of about 150 milliseconds I went from sitting relaxed in the bath to running downstairs naked screaming F**K, F**K, F**K!!!
When I'd turned the hot water tap on, there was a deafening 'water hammer', the like of which I'd never heard before. It sounded like a team of miners were attempting to knock my bathroom wall down with pickaxes. This was closey followed by a strange whooshing noise, then vast amounts of scalding steam erupted from the tap, blasting boiling rust-coloured water into the jug and knocking it from my hands.
I got out of there so quickly that I was halfway down the stairs before I could even think. Then I paused, and decided to go back and turn the tap off.
It already was like a bloody sauna in there and my heart was beating like a drum. I hadn't a clue what had just happened. I had to wrap a towel round the tap to turn it off because it was too hot to touch. Eventually I shut off the steam and water and stood there dripping and shaking, and then I saw what the problem was... The water heater gas jets were still burning away merrily even though the water wasn't running! The gas valve had obviously stuck open so the water in the water heater had been heated to boiling point while I was asleep in the bath.
I turned the gas supply off and was standing next to the water heater when I heard another strange noise, this time a kind of fizzing. The next moment, water started spraying out of the joint where the cold water inlet was attached to the heater. Cue another naked sprint down the stairs yelling expletives... If anybody had been passing my back yard at the time they'd have seen a big naked man running around my kitchen searching for the stop cock***. Fortunately, there was no-one about.
All in all, I had a very narrow escape. I could have got some terrible burns from all that steam and boiling water but it missed me by inches. There was also an obvious risk of the boiler exploding if I'd not woken up when I did. I even managed to turn the water supply off before any major water damage was done, just a few stains on the wall and a pile of soggy towels.
And the moral of today's little story is - Make sure that you have your gas appliances serviced regularly folks!
*** As an aside - there is a firm of female plumbers in the area who go by the brilliant name of Stop Cocks!
I went out for a ride on Saturday evening and took in a nice selection of local hills. It wasn't a long ride, only 25 miles, but I made an effort to climb the hills faster than I normally do to pack as much into the ride as I could.
I was feeling pretty tired when I got back so I decided to treat myself to a nice long soak in the bath. Very relaxing it was too, so much so that I dozed off for about 15 minutes. Eventually, I woke up and decided to wash my hair and leaned forward with a plastic jug in my hands to fill with fresh hot water from the tap...
Some sort of Time Dilation Effect then took place! In the course of about 150 milliseconds I went from sitting relaxed in the bath to running downstairs naked screaming F**K, F**K, F**K!!!
When I'd turned the hot water tap on, there was a deafening 'water hammer', the like of which I'd never heard before. It sounded like a team of miners were attempting to knock my bathroom wall down with pickaxes. This was closey followed by a strange whooshing noise, then vast amounts of scalding steam erupted from the tap, blasting boiling rust-coloured water into the jug and knocking it from my hands.
I got out of there so quickly that I was halfway down the stairs before I could even think. Then I paused, and decided to go back and turn the tap off.
It already was like a bloody sauna in there and my heart was beating like a drum. I hadn't a clue what had just happened. I had to wrap a towel round the tap to turn it off because it was too hot to touch. Eventually I shut off the steam and water and stood there dripping and shaking, and then I saw what the problem was... The water heater gas jets were still burning away merrily even though the water wasn't running! The gas valve had obviously stuck open so the water in the water heater had been heated to boiling point while I was asleep in the bath.
I turned the gas supply off and was standing next to the water heater when I heard another strange noise, this time a kind of fizzing. The next moment, water started spraying out of the joint where the cold water inlet was attached to the heater. Cue another naked sprint down the stairs yelling expletives... If anybody had been passing my back yard at the time they'd have seen a big naked man running around my kitchen searching for the stop cock***. Fortunately, there was no-one about.
All in all, I had a very narrow escape. I could have got some terrible burns from all that steam and boiling water but it missed me by inches. There was also an obvious risk of the boiler exploding if I'd not woken up when I did. I even managed to turn the water supply off before any major water damage was done, just a few stains on the wall and a pile of soggy towels.
And the moral of today's little story is - Make sure that you have your gas appliances serviced regularly folks!
*** As an aside - there is a firm of female plumbers in the area who go by the brilliant name of Stop Cocks!
Ok that's got me. I had just got used to "LOL" and "ROFL" but what's "FAF"?
