When we got up this morning there was no water. A quick call to the water company and, nope, they didn't have a water main problem. DOH! It's been -5 here overnight and the day time temps in the low 20s. Hmmm. We are doing some remodeling and a plumber was out here two days ago. I checked the meter well and he had left the lid off. I spent about 40 minutes with a torch but finally got it running again and so far it doesn't look like any damage. Either a valve was frozen or it wasn't frozen long enough to rupture a pipe. I have a flood light in the meter well just to make sure it's good and warm and I'll check it for pooling water before I close it up later today.
I have 15 gallons of water stored in the garage and I thought that would be enough to get us through a small inconvenience and it actually did. However, I went through 10 gallons in no time. I have 2.5 gallon tanks on the toilets (No, I will never convert to water saving toilets. But thanks for asking) so two flushes and 5 gallons is gone.
What are the lessons?
1. Never leave the meter lid off the well in -0 weather.
2. Buy more water jugs for additional storage.
I have a 50 gallon hot water tank and could certainly have tapped into that if I needed it but I think more storage will just be more convenient. As I'm getting older I find the 2.5 gallon containers a lot easier to carry upstairs than the 5 gallon ones.
The point of this is you might want to reconsider how much water you have stored. It's just my wife and I and we finished off 10 gallons in about 1 hour.
