We were counting ourselves lucky. The train we'd got - the last one from London - was due in at 01:18am and somehow it arrived 40 minutes early - at 12:40. Because of the horrible weather, we grabbed a cab outside the station instead of walking across town to the non-hansom cab office. This meant we were pulling into our road before 1am.
1st thing we noticed was that the alarm light was flashing on the house. After our previous experiences with the burglars (Break-in-Part1, Break-in-Part2) we were a bit nervous. We looked around the outside of the house but nothing looked disturbed or tampered with. Bizarre.
Still, we were a bit nervous when we opened the door, and we opened it very carefully and cautiously.
Something *was* wrong. There was a terrible smell of gas.
Fortunately, due to the recent cold weather, the hallway in our house contained a collection of torches which we'd been taking with us in the car just in case of any snow-induced breakdown incidents.
Dan grabbed a torch and we went through the house, opening all the doors and windows to get rid of the gas.
I rang the gas emergency number 0800 111 999 which is the number for Transco/National Grid. I placed the call at 01:06am and they gave us a list of things to do - don't switch on any electrical equipment, check, open the windows & doors, check, switch off the gas at the mains...errr....what? Where is the meter? I had no idea!
It took me a few moments to remember that the meter is actually outside - no wonder I'd not seen it before!
So we managed to get the gas turned off at the mains, and then waited for the gas board man to come.
01:46 he arrived - complete with gas detector sniffer.
He moved around the house with the detector, and due to our excellent fumigation techniques of EVERY door and window open in the house, he couldn't detect any that was lingering in the building.
He then went to turn on the gas at the mains to find out where the gas was escaping from.
It took me a few moments to remember that the meter is actually outside - no wonder I'd not seen it before! So we managed to get the gas turned off at the mains, and then waited for the gas board man to come.
01:46 he arrived - complete with gas detector sniffer.
He moved around the house with the detector, and due to our excellent fumigation techniques of EVERY door and window open in the house, he couldn't detect any that was lingering in the building.
He then went to turn on the gas at the mains to find out where the gas was escaping from.
The smell seemed to be coming from the kitchen, so he concentrated on the boiler and the stove. Bingo! It was one of the valves on the hob which looks like it had stuck open.
"Obviously", he said, "I'm going to have to disconnect you from the mains until your hob can be replaced".
"Well, obviously", I replied. "I'm not exactly going to turn the gas back on, am I?"
"You'd be surprised what people do" he said, and off he went to cap the pipe at the meter.
So there we were, at 2am, having had all the doors and windows open in the house for an hour, sub zero temperatures outside, and no heat!
"Obviously", he said, "I'm going to have to disconnect you from the mains until your hob can be replaced".
"Well, obviously", I replied. "I'm not exactly going to turn the gas back on, am I?"
"You'd be surprised what people do" he said, and off he went to cap the pipe at the meter.
So there we were, at 2am, having had all the doors and windows open in the house for an hour, sub zero temperatures outside, and no heat!
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