We say this a lot: "it's always something up here," meaning something is always coming up. I'm not going to say 'going wrong' but that's closer to the truth.

Today I noticed the furnace was making funny noises, but it was the kind of noises it makes when it's working, so I didn't think much of it. What I noticed was the timing - it wasn't the time of day it should have been cycling on and off.

So around 5:30 clouds moved in and it started to cool down in here, and the furnace wasn't coming on. The pilot light was working just fine - the plumber looked at it on Thursday and said it was in good shape. For some reason the burners weren't coming on to heat the water in the boiler. Finally, I called the plumber (who is an hour away) and told him about the problem. He said to try shutting everything off so it might re-set when I turned it back on, and he could come up tomorrow morning.

I did all that, and no change. Then he called me back and said he was coming tonight because he wouldn't be able to sleep for worrying about what could possibly be wrong. It has been warm, but a cold front is moving in and tomorrow night will be 30 degrees.

Turns out the problem was a loose wire on the gas controller. There is a good chance the electricians working on the generator knocked it loose when they were running cables through there on Friday. The plumber didn't have the parts he needed on his truck, but he's going to call the electricians in the morning and they will bring it with them and fix it tomorrow. I think I'll put a little box or something over it to keep things from hitting up against it until all the work is done.

While we waited for the system to get going, I had a nice chat with the plumber about maintaining my hot water heating system, so it was worth the trouble just for that.

On another note, I was having trouble with my motion-triggered driveway lights all summer. One of the electricians stayed in the guest cabin Saturday night and he took a look at it. Turned out the support post was loose because the underground part has rotted off, so the sensor was pointing downward more than it should. He stabilized it by wrapping bailing wire between it and a nearby utility pole. It worked fine tonight when the plumber came down the drive, so I'm very excited to have that fixed.

And the heating system, of course.