My mistake

So for the last month or so I've caught a whiff of gas outside my house and down the street every once in a while. I had been meaning to call PGW but always forgot (forgetfullness seems to be a recurring theme in my life now). So yesterday I put it on my TO DO list and when I had a chance that afternoon, I called the number they tell you to call when you smell gas. (mistake #1)

An hour or so later I get a call from the gas man asking if I'm home. No, but I thought my roommate might have been home. Well lady there is no one home and we need to get in the house so we are going to call the locksmith. Uh, no. Can you wait a couple hours till one of us gets home? No it is an emergency, this is an emergency, there is gas leaking in the street and we need to see if it is seeping through your walls. At this point I'm thinking, why our walls? Are you going to break into everyone else's house to check? Nooooooo. Just because I gave the guy my address when he asked where I lived he's going to get a locksmith. (mistake #2)

I told him I'll call him back. At this point, my one roommate and I are just sitting down to some wings, I don't have my bike so it would take about an hour to get home. My other roommate left for a cruise (lucky her!) and my fourth roommate works until 7. It is about 4:30 at this point. So I call my landlords to see if they can make the short trip down from their office to open the door. I really don't want a locksmith coming, even though they do bring the police with them (how kind) and barging into our house. Of course, neither one of them answer their cell phones or their office phones so I leave messages (and of course, neither one of them cared to call me back even though I personally think a gas leak might be of interest to them since they own the property).

So my roommate SP calls the guy back and talks to him and gets the same message - man this is an emERgncy man, we come out here we gotta check'n see if thurrs gas. An emERgency. So SP says he'll ride home and let him in, and sure enough, there's no gas leaking from our house. Readinsgs are 0. But in the street, readings are 100. Whatever those numbers mean.

Crisis over. (mistake #3). When SP and I get home later that evening, the little PGW gas truck is still on the street and they are down the manhole. We kind of chuckled thinking it was funny that they were still out there. But alas, at 5am the next morning, I was awoken with the racket of jackhammers or some sort of loud banging device which has continued pretty much consistently now for 1.5 hours. Which is why it is 6:30am and I am writing this blog.

I just wanted to get a good start to my Saturday. (mistake #4). Sleep in a little bit, start studying early, maybe go for a run. But thanks to my desire to complete my TO DO list, we all suffer. Who would have thought a utility company in Philly would be so prompt and responsible?