D'oh!

Oh man, I hate it when I do things like this.

Like most people, when it starts to get cold each winter, Dick and I will turn on the heaters on both floors (2 condos, 2 furnaces). Both furnaces are pretty old, but the one for upstairs is really old. For the last couple of years, when I tried to turn on the upstairs heat, it wouldn't work, and we'd have to go down to the basement to light the pilot light, and that would get it up and running. While we're down there, we also remember to change filters. :)

About 3 weeks ago, it started to get really cold, so we turned on the heat, but nothing happened. We went to the basement, lit the pilot light, tried to turn it on again, but still... nada.

When we moved the switch on the thermostat, we could hear the little "click" that you hear when you know it's turning on, but nothing was happening. We fiddled with it for quite some time, then figured that a) the thermostat was broken and needed to be replaced, b) the furnace was kerbusted and needed to be replaced, or c) all of the above.

I asked my contractor for a recommendation for a heating company, and got an immediate referral. (always nice) When I called the company, they were booked solid (because it's the beginning of winter, and everyone is calling them now!) and I had to wait more than a week for an appointment. Which is fine.

So, the repair guy came out this morning. I told him the situation. He came upstairs to check out the thermostat first. He turned it up all the way. (I had tested it by turning it up to 75 or 80 degrees, but not all the way up to 90)

Before we headed down to the basement, he asked to use our bathroom. While he was in there, I started to smell that familiar smell that the heater makes when it's blowing warm air up the ducts for the first time in a year....

What, really?

So yeah. The heat was working again. And all he did was turn up the thermostat.
...and we've been freezing our tushes off for the past 3 weeks.

Duh.

He was super nice. Since he really didn't do anything, he offered not to charge me, even though I knew that the company had a minimum 1 hour charge. He also offered to take a peek at our furnace to check it out. He said it was at least 30 years old, and that we should plan to replace it soon.

Anyhow, it was a funny story, and I really appreciate that he was so nice and didn't charge us. You know they'll get our business when we decide to replace the furnace!