Yay to Monoxide detectors!

3 a.m., the CO alarm goes off.. reading 97 ppm. High level. In a dazed fog I awake and think about what I am to do.. I shut off the furnace and call the gas company. They then in turn contact the fire department and within about 5 minutes about 5 very lovely firemen were at my door.

They took their meter around the house, and found no CO. They checked everything over.. Lyric joked about me making pancakes for everyone... hehe. They asked about the furnace, I told them the story of how it stopped working and the repairman came.. and how the guy told me there was a crack in the heat exchanger and what he was supposed to shut it off.. but that the CO levels in the house were low so he would leave it on. And of course I know nothing.. I don't understand what heat exchangers do.. The fire chief says that he was supposed to shut the furnace down.. by law. And was quite worried and surprised he left it on. So he told me to leave the windows open a crack.

Then the gas guy comes to do his inspection. He waves his gas testing machine around and finds a leak coming from our water heater. Then proceeds to tell me he's got to shut the gas off.. so there goes our water and our heat. I then call Direct Energy back again to send a service repairman.

It's now about 9 a.m.. A different repairman comes and fixes the gas leak problem.. it was only a loose connector joint. I proceed to tell him about the furnace and what has happened. He becomes quite concerned. He then checks over the furnace and confirms the Heat Exchanger is cracked.. and yes, it should have legally been shut down because it will leak CO into the house.

I am just baffled.. how this first repairman would put my family at risk. We could have died. The second repairman was also in shock and called in a complaint for us. He was just beside himself that this guy would put us, especially with Lyric in the house at risk.

The Direct Energy sales guy comes at 11:30. Gives us 2 quotes .. one about 4200k, and the other close to 5000k. UNBELIEVABLE. And on top of that I have to jump through hoops to get about 1200k back from government programs... sigh.. like I have tmie and energy for that! And you have to pay to have the assessments done too!

So I called the management at Direct Energy to complain..the guy was shocked that the furnace was left on. So I explained that he put my family's lives at risk and that it's imcomprehensible that he would do that. He agreed and said they would try and do something to help me with a new furnace. Great.. but he said not for about 24 hours. I said I'm sorry, but I can't wait 24 hours. I have 2 kids, one with cancer that needs heat NOW. I have to get this done today. He said he would try. I am however going to look into a lawyer in regards to this matter as well. He broke the law and put my family at risk!

Paul had a friend at work who sent his friend here who does HVAC. He gave us a big break and is going to charge us $2500 cash.. so my wonderful and dear cousins are helping me pay for the furnace to get installed. I have no other choice.

Someone please wake me up when the nightmare is over. Ugh.. I'm not sure if I can take anymore.