I am SO proud of 4 dogs -- they handled this SO well and were SOOOOO incredibly good to roll with what could have been a disaster.
We got home at 10:00 from the vet's tonight (Kee Shu and Billy acupuncture night and some supper) to the smell of gas. Oh my -- whatta ker-fuffle! HUGE gas leak -- we called Amerigas and they barely answered (on hold for an eternity -- and HEY I GOTTA LEAK Answer already!!!) -- had to call 911 and evacuate the house. Fire Dept got here fast and they got the pilot light to the hot water tank turned off.
Big huge leak -- they couldn't get it to shut off -- some sort of 'overflow' valve that failed. It's midnight and the fire department just left -- Amerigas FINALLY got here. They said in 25 and 32 years of service (Amerigas guy and Fire Dept guy) that they'd never EVER seen this particular part 'fail'.
Sooooooooooooooo I have to have a whole new gas tank *again* (it's only 2 years old) -- not sure I trust them to secure my gates and start my tank, but I'll see what happens in the morning. I shouldn't be too late -- we're just out a whole $600 load of gas I think -- *sigh* But at LEAST they didn't have to burn the whole darned thing off. That would have taken another 2-3 hours.
But here we're sitting rolled out of the house with four dogs and the cockatiel. Dripping rain ... finally got my wheelchair down to the road (firetruck in driveway -- and my yard is TOO soggy for me to step on ... ugh SO embarassing - I hate having to resort to the danged chair!)
But we're down at the street -- 2 humans and 4 dogs all watching 3 firetrucks, an ambulance (just in case, I guess) and the gas truck (Luna a bit crazed and barking some at the fire department guys who are running all over with hoses, flashlights and generally looking rushed and like something a dog oughta bark AT) but mostly SO good.
Billy (playing Mr. Perfect to ... perfection!!) just sat and watched it all. He was on a loose leash. He went up and sniffed Hootie (normally the bird is on top of their crates so they're all used to smells but not 'eye to eye';) and Hootie hissed and Billy said "OK -- I'll just step back!" (repeat same thing 5 minutes later with Luna). Tink says "that thing hisses and makes noise I ain't goin CLOSE! NO WAY!!!" Kee in my arms -- chilled out from acupuncture and she was "with" so she didn't care!
Luna was the only one who needed a close leash -- but of course she's the 'worrier' of the bunch.
Eventually they got it to abate enough to get the cars away from the house so then it's 2 humans, 4 dogs and a cockatiel in on PT Cruizer!! LOL -- family togetherness?
The Amerigas guy finally toggled something up that got the leak to stop but we'll likely lose ALL that propane.
Tomorrow they have to replace the whole tank because of this one part. *sigh* 200 gallons of propane -- coulda made us a big old explosion that could have sent us all to Kingdom come. The Alpha of all Alphas was surely looking out for all of us tonight!!
Way more excitement than we wanted but it coulda been SO much worse. As it was it turned out to just be a super good exercise in socialization and we think Hootie just plain had a grand time. By the end of it in the cruizer, Hootie and Iw ere whistling a duet and the dogs were ignoring us!