I begin to disassemble the heater, figuring that starting with cleaning the system and keeping my eyes open for obvious problems during that process would be a good start. Then I remember that, oh yeah, the guys have always had to take down the automatic fire extinguisher system when they work on this. Crap!

Let’s also remember that I am several inches shorter than the guys who usually do this, 4 months slightly awkward, and in an unprecedented fit of girlishness the other day, have had a set of nails put on my fingers. They look so nice against the background of tools and engines.

And I don’t have that innate guy thing where you can look at a random bolt on the wall and instinctively know that it’s a 5/8 whatever. Given the correct tools, I can operate them just fine, but it takes me a little while to do the math and figure out what the next fraction down is likely to be. And where someone else might have put it last time it was used.

After standing on my tiptoes enough for one session (no, there’s not an easy place to put a box or something ~ I’m not that blonde!), I have it taken apart to this stage. The nozzle is inside the circle there, and I can’t quite figure out how it comes apart. The little turnkey thingy that would make the most sense to me clearly hasn’t been turned recently, unless it was a gorilla who tightened it back up. As Tana would say, friggidyfrigfrig! I think I’ll leave it for a little while and come back to it tonight.

The silver lining here is that when you’re working, 59 degrees is a very comfortable temperature…