Water and Power - Brian
Shannon and I returned home late last week from our annual trip to Black Rock City (I’ll write more about that once I’ve gathered all the photos), quite tired and jetlagged but happy to be back home in Granada. As is normal, when we entered our house there was no power. For reasons unknown to us, every time we go on vacation we return to find that the circuit breaker for the house has tripped. It was funny the first few times, but now leaving and knowing part of the packing is to empty the refrigerator, meaning we come home to a house with little food, has become a little annoying. Its like the house gets angry at us; when we have people watch the house the same thing happens, even when they reset the breaker its still off by the time we arrive at the door. Maybe the house secretly loves Milo and hates to see him go.
This time was a little different though, one circuit of the house was out for good – a short somewhere. Lucky for us it was the circuit that runs the hot water, refrigerator, oven and computers, it reminded us of being in Black Rock City again. Also lucky for us we have lots of extension cords; with a cord running from the rooftop terrace where the gas hot water heater is to the bedroom on the floor below we were able to get a hot shower going and begin the jetlag recovery process.
The next day I called Timoteo and the next evening he was at the house to have a look. I’m not sure if its good or bad that when I called him and said it was Brian he said “Oh, Calle Gloria.” Home wiring is a little different here than in the US. Our circuit panel is in the outside wall of our house – the circuits are inside, and on the street there is a door (no lock, which our friend Crash and his sharpie discovered) with the meter and the back side of the circuit box, should you wish to pull some wires out when you walk down the street. Inside the house the walls are all cement and the wires run in conduits to various junction boxes scattered around the house. The junction boxes are mostly located near the ceiling, making life really easy for Timoteo. The wiring itself is not the Romex you’re used to seeing, its just a bunch of single wires, all of which are either brown, blue or black.
Debugging the problem was a sequence of opening the junction boxes, disconnecting various wires and pulling them to see where they came out in the next junction box to isolate the problem. It turned out that the outlet for our electric oven had rusted out and was the cause of the short-circuit. Maybe the house doesn’t secretly love Milo, its been the rusting outlet causing troubles. Maybe next trip there will be a cold beer waiting for me when I return? Happy thoughts, however short-lived, the circuit tripped again at about 3am that night; it reset just fine and it seems again like we’re really back at home.