A few weeks ago I received this notification from WordPress. It’s hard to believe that this experiment has turned into ten years of writing! I thought I’d share a few of my reflections on blogging, kind of my top ten thoughts (or perhaps the first ten).
10. Apropos, I discovered that people like lists and these have been popular over the years.
9. The “Growing Up in Youngstown” posts were unplanned. I thought I would write my response to a question people could ask to learn things about me they probably didn’t know, which was “what was it like to grow up in working class Youngstown?” When I wrote a second post on food and it went viral, I decided there was something here.
8. I’ve learned that not only our memories but our history in a place are important. I’m convinced schools ought to have a semester on local history so people know the story of their place, and perhaps learn to care more about perpetuating the best and to avoid the mistakes of the past. Youngstown has often been know for rust and the mob. There is so much more and I’ve loved mining the riches of our local culture, people, and history.
7. Writing book reviews are probably the easiest, because I’ve been thinking about them while reading the books. The Youngstown pieces are the hardest–coming up with an idea (especially after nearly ten years), researching it, finding usable images or getting permissions. The writing is the fun part–most of the time, I’m trying to weave all I’ve learned into a story.
6. One of the surprises in all this are the wonderful (for the most part) people I’ve met–people who have helped with information about articles, publicists for book publishers, and authors, in most cases grateful for the time and care you took with their baby. I would especially single out followers, including people I meet who tell me they have been following for years and found some books they really liked. The others are family members of some of the people I’ve written about who write and tell me they are grateful that someone remembered their loved one and the contribution they made in their time. That means so much. Over a lifetime, I’ve become so aware that we all stand on the shoulders of others, yet so often forget to tell their stories.
5. I’ve learned to appreciate the craft of writing reviews and the people who do this for a living (believe it or not, I just do this because I love books, love encouraging others to read, as well as love getting at least some of my books for free in exchange for the review!). It’s a constant challenge to say enough about a book so that people can decide whether or not they want to buy it and not so much that they feel no need to! For some, any plot information is a “spoiler.”
4. I probably did not choose the path to fast blog success. I write a lot about theological books, but also about contemporary novels, poetry, science, other non-fiction including history, biography, and contemporary affairs. I’d probably do better if I stuck to one of these niches, or just wrote about Youngstown. I’m glad, over the years to find other book omnivores who are interested, or tolerate my own omnivorous reading tastes. And that’s without a lot of the provocative fireworks that drive social media engagement at the expense of manipulating emotion.
3. What I have tried to do is just keep showing up, writing a post six days a week (I take Sundays off and re-run a Youngstown post in Youngstown groups). I’ve tried to be consistent. At some point, I may transition to four a week, but will try to maintain a consistent rhythm. People like consistency!
2. I think the blog on the whole is one of the best parts of online media, even though other media have arisen. I’ve found the support by WordPress far superior to other social media sites, many of which you cannot reach for support–even if they have taken some action against you–which has frustrated many of my friends. And by and large, the trolls have been almost non-existent and WordPress uses really good spam-filtering software. They make it easy to do the one thing you came to do–blog!
1. Finally, I’ve touched on this throughout, but you have made this a joy. I so appreciate those who comment and share their own knowledge, which often surpasses mine. Some of you have put me on to books and authors I would not otherwise have looked at. I hope I have returned the favor. Thank you.
And for those who geek out on statistics, here are a few you might enjoy (all are as of this writing):
It’s the nearly daily phone calls, emails, or letters offering to buy my house, often “as is.”
It’s noticing the increasing number of homes in our neighborhood that are rentals.
It’s the story of residents in a nearby municipality fighting the efforts of a company to build a development of homes that all would be for rent only. And this is not affordable housing but homes with rents of $2300 to $2700 a month.
It is the complaint of friends trying to buy homes finding themselves either priced out of a rapidly rising market in neighborhoods they could at one time have bought in, or trying to make offers, often above asking price on homes before they hit the market and coming in second or third in the bidding.
It’s the skyrocketing of home values in our area, evident in the most recent property valuation from our county auditor nearly doubling its value. I’m glad we bought here 33 years ago. I probably couldn’t now.
There are some dynamics that are peculiar to our market. We have a housing shortage in the one part of the state where population is rapidly growing. A number of tech giants are building new plants or data or distribution centers in our community, and this is having a multiplier effect on construction, supporting industries, infrastructure development, and the education sector. It means more jobs, more people, and more needs for housing.
One of the factors contributing to all of this are big investors and corporations buying up homes to rent. Many of these are out of state. American Homes for Rent (AMH) is one such company, one of the major players nationally in this growing trend. They own 2100 homes in our market and 2000 in another major city in our state, They are the company behind the proposed development exclusively consisting of rental homes mentioned above. In our area, home ownership has dropped from 60% in 2005 to 53% in 2019. Our county now has the highest ratio of renters to owners in our state. In 2021, institutional investors bought 33,000 homes in our state, accounting for 21 percent of all sales, double from just the year before. That is how fast this is growing.
All of this is legal, mostly because our laws have not kept up with this trend of institutional home-buying. Legislators are beginning to propose measures to regulate these efforts, remove some tax breaks or even increase taxes on these enterprises. Local municipalities are beginning to resist efforts to create rental only developments. Tonight’s news brought a report that the local community where American Homes for Rent was seeking to build such a development has voted down this development.
Not all that is legal is right. In this case I also believe this is poor public policy.
Neighborhoods with high percentages of home ownership are better maintained and more stable. The transience of rentals leads to less ties among neighborhoods, less looking out for each other.
It has never been demonstrated that absentee landlords care for properties to the same standard as home owners.
Home ownership is one of the most significant factors contributing to intergenerational wealth. We have witnessed a growing disparity between the wealthiest among us and the rest of our country.
Much of the earnings of institutional investors are siphoned away from our communities. At one time, your mortgage lender was a local banker and often a significant part of your payments were cycled back to depositors or lent out to others. Homeowners spent money repairing and improving their homes at local businesses or hired local people to do work on those homes. Homeowners have far more of, and a different stake, in local issues than do institutional investors.
The question we have to face as a society is how much we value home ownership by individuals and families versus big, off-site corporations and financial institutions? There is so much of the “local” that many of our communities have already lost from local restaurants and small businesses. People owning the place in which they live is one of the last redoubts of the local. The more one diminishes the number of people who are stakeholders in a community, the more that community is at the mercy of those with money and power–whether that of impersonal, off-site interests or local gangs and corrupt organizations. The greater the amount of the homes, businesses, and other tangible institutions of a community are controlled by off-site interests, the less there is a fabric of community linking people together.
So what is to be done? I am not an expert in these things but it seems that a starting point is to figure out ways to level the playing field. Big investors often offer to buy homes “as is,” pay cash, pay above market prices, and have greater access about homes coming on the market. That doesn’t sound like a level playing field. I wonder what might be done about that? Might there be ways to assist individual buyers if it is not possible to offset the advantages for institutional investors. Sellers do have the option to not sell to institutional buyers who are not covered as a protected class under Fair Housing Laws. But they might have to accept a lower offer. What if there were offsets, like credits on capital gains taxes, for sellers who make this choice?
One thing is clear. We face a choice about whether we will be a nation of owners or renters.
I discovered a new use for those left over face masks from the pandemic this summer. It began on an evening in June when I was working in my back yard and I kept coughing and my throat felt raspy. My eyes were burning. And I noticed the haze in the evening sky turning the sun deep crimson. Smoke. From fires in Canada. In the last few days, it has been back for the third time–a plume of smoke that had its origins in western Canada as unprecedented dry conditions have resulted in a summer of fires across Canada. This plume eventually covered all of the northern US, traveling more than 2500 miles just to reach us. Every time our winds come from the north, our air conditions deteriorate. At its worst, our Air Quality Index hit 233, considered very unhealthy for everyone. I go for evening walks. I wore a face mask on a few of the worst evenings. I delayed cutting my lawn to avoid making things any worse.
Until this year, this was something I heard about from friends in the west. Now I wonder if this will be a recurring problem.
My sister lives in Phoenix. They have just surpassed the record for consecutive days in excess of 110 degrees. The ten day forecast suggests there is no relief in sight. Her air conditioning runs constantly. Buying any refrigerated groceries is a challenge. The temperatures there are part of a heat dome that has covered much of the south and southwest this summer.
Triple digit heat domes have hit Europe and China as well. I just heard that the fifteen hottest days on record on Earth have all been in July 2023. And when this happens, people who don’t have access to adequate hydration and places to cool off begin dying. Cooling largely still relies on carbon-based fuels in many parts of the world, so increased cooling means increased emissions of greenhouse gases–a vicious cycle.
Meanwhile, locations as diverse as the Hudson Valley, Vermont, parts of the south, and even the Taj Mahal are facing flooding from record rains. Early this year, after years of drought, the western U.S. was inundated with an “atmospheric river” of repeated rainstorms. In the middle of the country, it has been an active tornado season and, to date, 74 people have died, three times the typical year.
The ocean is experiencing a heat wave as well with temperatures in the Atlantic off Florida in excess of 90 degrees, and similarly in parts of the Gulf of Mexico. Hurricane season hasn’t begun but ocean heat feeds super storms. Meanwhile, the danger is the destruction of coral reefs, and in turn, the aquatic populations that inhabit them.
All of this obscures ongoing processes of melting glaciers, Antarctic and Greenland ice and permafrost melting releasing methane, raising ocean and CO2 levels over the long term.
It feels to me that in the 1980’s and 1990’s, the planet was whispering to us about the changes occurring. In the last two decades, we’ve gone from a whisper to urgent speaking tones. We noticed the milder winters and longer frost-free seasons. This summer, it feels like Earth has begun to shout. Is it saying, “This is the new normal” or “You ain’t seen nothing yet”? I sense that it is probably the latter from all I have read.
It means several things to me. One is that we are going to see rising climate mitigation costs, in the forms of insurance, tax-funded government aid, food production costs and more. If we decide to seriously address carbon-emissions, this will mean rethinking life as we know it. We think tech will fix it but I don’t know any technology that doesn’t require energy. Relying only on wind, solar, hydro, and nuclear raises questions in my mind about whether these can generate enough unless we change the way we live. It makes me wonder about what a life not as reliant on combustion or electricity is like. Perhaps we need to study the Amish.
Earlier this year, I read Stephan Markley’s The Deluge, a prophetic book if there is one. It is a fictional account of the near future exploring the challenges posed to our public and political and international order by accelerating extreme weather events. It’s scary.
At one time I thought it would be our children who would face the consequences of our climate incontinence. Now it seem increasingly likely that we’ll face this with them, with the increased vulnerabilities of age. And so I think about what it will mean to lean into my faith as I face this. For me, Philippians 4:13 comes to mind: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Paul speaks of this in times of plenty or want. What it does suggest is that even if life is stripped down to the bare necessities of survival, the love empowered by Christ of God and neighbor and the peace of being in relationship with God remain. It seems to me that now is the time to ask what will spiritually sustain us for the time ahead. Rather than trying to maintain the illusions of normal, of the American dream, we need to ask what will sustain us if times get hard, and the core of our humanity is challenged.
It seems to me that this summer is the Earth’s wake up call, and it is too insistent to hit the snooze button. As we rub our burning eyes, we need to ask how now will we live? How will we live toward God, toward each other, and toward our changing planet? Whether we ask it or not, we are answering this question day by day.
With all the announcements of people who are running for president in 2024. As of this writing, fifteen people have announced candidacies (11 Republicans, 3 Democrats, and 1 third party). The rhetoric is already rancorous and plays on dividing “us” from “them.” I have resolved that I will in no way be a part of this game. I’ve watched friends and families separate. I’ve witnessed the “othering” of various groups–creating “them” versus “us” rather than just “us.” Too many friends, and to be honest, too many fellow followers of Christ are in groups that some would want me to fear or sanction or oppose. I’m not going there. These are family. So here are some things I’ve resolved:
To remind myself daily that Jesus is Lord, and far more important to me than any politician or political party or agenda.
To equally remind myself daily that the global family of God whose first allegiance is to God’s rule is my family and takes precedence over my earthly citizenship, party affiliation, or any other membership. The latter are not unimportant but of lesser importance, penultimate.
I will not discuss political candidates or who I am voting for (and I do believe votes matter) in public, and especially on social media.
I will discuss issues that I care about, and that I think should unite us, even if politicians are trying to use them as a wedge to divide us. To do so means I won’t fit in any of the partisan categories. For example, no party that I know of is consistently pro-life. I believe you cannot be for the lives of some and not for others. Dealing with and limiting the effects of climate change is another. The weather affects all of us.
I will not share memes or stories about politicians and exercise care to ascertain the truthfulness of anything I do share. I will focus on what builds bridges of understanding and work for the common good, not what builds walls.
I will keep scripture and prayer before and above news and monitor the impact of news media on my spirit.
I will remember that politics is “just politics.” Necessary but not the only or most important thing in life. I will not let it take my life captive and as a leader in my congregation, I will resist any attempts to take the church captive to politics.
I will not forget the axiom that “all politics are local.” In our obsession with national politics, we forget that important matters are being weighed by our local school board, our local city council or county commissioners, at our state house.
I will listen to friends who differ with me to understand why other valuable human beings see things so differently. I’ll be glad to talk with others who are similarly curious about me, but not otherwise.
I will focus my life on the Creation Mandates of Genesis 1 and 2, the Great Commandment (Matthew 22:37-40) and the Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20) and I will work in solidarity with all who share these life-framing commitments of the Christian.
I’ve written here openly about my faith and I realize that not all of you share that faith and that some who share my faith will not share my convictions about how faith should shape one’s approach to the elections. I share this because I don’t want to be caught unawares by another election. If it is helpful for you, all the better. And if not, that’s OK. You are a fellow human being, which is of infinitely greater worth than any political difference.
One of the most exciting and disturbing developments that has come to light in the last year is the development of highly sophisticated artificial intelligence “chatbots” capable of producing text often indistinguishable from and sometimes superior to that of human beings, across a variety of subjects. The most prominent of these is ChatGPT, developed by OpenAI. ChatGPT stands for Chat Generative Pre-Trained Transformer. It was released in prototype version November 30, 2022, resulting in an explosion of discussion.
ChatGPT will respond to a question or command. For esample, I asked ChatGPT “Who was Louis Bromfield?” ChatGPT responded:
Louis Bromfield was an American author and conservationist, born in Ohio in 1896. He was a successful and popular writer in the 1920s and 1930s, producing a number of novels, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning “Early Autumn” (1926). He was also known for his conservation work and was a pioneer in sustainable agriculture and land management practices.
In the 1930s, Bromfield established an experimental farm in Ohio, known as Malabar Farm, where he implemented his ideas about conservation and sustainable agriculture. He wrote several books about his experiences on the farm, including “Malabar Farm” (1947) and “Pleasant Valley” (1945), which detailed his efforts to preserve the natural environment and promote sustainable farming practices.
Bromfield’s work had a significant impact on the fields of agriculture and conservation, and his legacy continues to influence modern thinking about sustainable land management and environmental protection.
ChatGPT, generated 2/2/2023 at 7:38pm
I subsequently asked it “Say more about his writing and how its works are evaluated.” It produced a response focusing on his novels but says little about his later works which were generally considered inferior, churned out to fund his farming efforts. So, I asked it about his work at Malabar Farm in Mansfield, Ohio, which I have visited several times. It described his pioneering efforts in sustainable agriculture and described the farm as financially successful. The latter is a more dubious claim. Bromfield was constantly trying to raise money from writing and movie deals to make ends meet.
What is concerning to many is that ChatGPT generates responses that are often factual and crisply written, as in the example above. Can you see how this might be used by students pressed for time, or just not that eager to put in the work to write a term paper? There is a good deal of concerned conversation in academic circles about the implications for everything from admissions essays to term papers to academic articles.
It is also being suggested that ChatGPT and other chatbots could put writers out of business in many fields. It can write advertising blurbs and in some genres, especially those with fast turnaround times, novelist are using ChatGPT to at least help produce content.
One the positive side, a case can be made that ChatGPT is another tool, like Wikipedia or Google, to quickly research a subject. People are already talking about the kinds of tasks that could be done by a chatbot. This could improve productivity, although it may mean that many writing jobs may be on the line. It’s probably time for those who write in some form for a living to ask, “can a chatbot do that?”
At the same time, there are problems with blind reliance on chatbots. At its most basic, OpenAI warns, “May occasionally generate incorrect information.” I indicated some instances in the examples above where the responses were questionable. I also asked ChatGPT for citations supporting its responses and it said it could not do that but recommended several works, none of which, as far as I can ascertain, actually exist. This problem has been widely noted as has a tendency of ChatGPT to “hallucinate,” to create totally fanciful responses. ChatGPT also warns:
May occasionally produce harmful instructions or biased content
Limited knowledge of world and events after 2021
Teachers are already developing assignments that recognize the limitations of ChatGPT and testing those assignments on ChatGPT. Others are assuming its use and integrating it into the composition process. The use of ChatGBT actually offers an interesting exercise in how one verifies the veracity of information. Since the sources on which ChatGBT draws aren’t transparent, the writer will want to look at other reputable sources, and this helps teach discrimination between reputable and questionable sources.
The biggest problem, of course, is plagiarism. To use a ChatGBT product as verbatim, or substantially, without quotation marks or attribution, representing it as one’s own ideas, is plagiarism. TechCrunch reports that OpenAI has even created a tool to detect AI generated, including ChatGPT generated, text. At present, it is only 26 percent effective. Now the interesting question comes, how does one handle works that do cite ChatGPT? I suspect that syllabi and specific assignments will have to address this, as well as the consequences for Chatbot plagiarism.
So, what about blogs by chatbot? I tried this experiment. I asked ChatGPT to review Alex Haley’s Roots. I’ve never written a review of this book. It produced the following:
“Roots: The Saga of an American Family” by Alex Haley is a Pulitzer Prize-winning book and television miniseries that was first published in 1976. It is a historical novel that traces the journey of an African man named Kunta Kinte and seven generations of his descendants, from his capture and enslavement in Africa, to his life in America and the eventual liberation of his descendants. The book was based on Haley’s own genealogical research and oral history from his family, and it was groundbreaking in its depiction of the African American experience. It sparked a renewed interest in genealogy and African American history, and has been widely praised for its impact on American culture and society.
ChatGPT, generated 2/2/2023 at 7:00 pm
That’s a nice, succinct summary, but not nearly long enough for my blog reviews. So I tried this “Review in the style of bobonbooks.com.” ChatGPT produced this:
“Roots: The Saga of an American Family” by Alex Haley is a magnificent piece of literature that tells the story of one African American family’s journey from slavery to freedom. This book is a powerful and emotional read that provides a vivid representation of the horrors of slavery, as well as the resilience of the human spirit.
The narrative follows the life of Kunta Kinte, an African man who is captured and sold into slavery, and traces the experiences of his descendants over several generations. The character development is excellent, with each character being unique and memorable in their own way. Haley’s writing is both descriptive and evocative, painting a vivid picture of the time period and bringing the story to life.
One of the most significant aspects of “Roots” is its depiction of slavery, which is graphic, honest, and heart-wrenching. The book serves as a reminder of the atrocities committed against Africans and African Americans, and it’s a testament to the strength and resilience of the human spirit.
In conclusion, “Roots” is a landmark work of African American literature that should be read by all. Its impact on American culture and society cannot be overstated, and it remains an important and relevant book to this day. Highly recommended!
ChatGPT, generated 2/2/2023 at 7:02 pm
Hmm. That does sound a bit more like what I do–still shorter and less detailed than what I usually write. I rarely use words like “emotional read” or “Highly recommended.” I do like words like “resilience” and “evocative.” It does follow the form of many of my reviews, although it feels more “generic” than what I might write. And I found no typos, which can rarely be said of me. It would be interesting to know what others think.
But I won’t be turning to ChatGPT to write my reviews or other blog posts. Here’s why:
Fundamentally, I like crafting my own reviews. I write them to remember what I read.
ChatGPT cannot know by itself how I actually engaged with a book–what I thought, how I reacted–it can only summarize the content and mimic my style. There is a serendipitous element to all this–I often discover what I think as I write.
For better or worse, my writing cannot help but reflect my life experiences and my deepest values, neither of which are static.
Part of the implicit contract with both publisher and public is honesty. Will ChatGPT say that a book just doesn’t cut it?
No one needs to visit Bob on Books to know what ChatGBT thinks of a book (and I would have to be honest in attribution).
Chatbots are here to stay. We’ve been using Seri and Alexa for years. We engage them when we seek online support. And the new AI of ChatGBT is becoming increasingly successful at simulating our human neural networks while accessing vast sources of information and articulating its responses in reasonably interesting text. And those mistakes? AI is iterative, which means it learns and corrects those mistakes. I asked ChatGBT about something I’m very familiar with, the history of Youngstown. It was accurate, except it said that John Young was from Pennsylvania, when in fact, he was from Whitestown, New York. I corrected this and then asked where John Young was from and it gave the correct answer. Part of the reason for the free release of this powerful tool was to learn and refine it through user interactions like the ones I’ve recorded here.
But I won’t be using it to write my blog. I’ll keep reading the books, keep writing about things that interest me, and keep researching, checking sources against sources when I can. That doesn’t guarantee that I won’t make mistakes, but they’ll be mine, and part of my own iterative learning process, part of my lifelong formation. I will not delegate that to a chatbot.
My 3 1/2 year old furnace with a cracked heat exchanger.
This wasn’t the post I intended to write. But the day kind of went off the rails when our heating tech said something to the effect of “I can’t believe this!” and proceeded to tell me that the heat exchanger on our three and a half year old furnace was cracked. In case you don’t know–this is bad. As in carbon monoxide leaks. His next step was to shut off the gas supply to the furnace, his due diligence to protect his company from liability.
The news got worse. A repair bill in excess of $1000, and that was if they could get the part. I later learned that they probably wouldn’t get it until mid-December–almost two months. So I called the company we bought the furnace from. They are coming to check it tomorrow. They say they can get the part in 2-3 weeks, around the second week in November. The supply chain chickens have come home to roost for us.
I learned from our technician that this particular part is known to crack where ours cracked and that newer models have redesigned the heat exchanger. And he reminded me that replacement parts for furnaces may be like those on cars, not usually as good as OEM parts. So we could well have the problem again, maybe several times during the life of the furnace.
Hmm. It used to be that heat exchangers lasted the life of the furnace. But in this case, the metal is thinner. I’m thinking that maybe this furnace’s life has ended–for us. I don’t want a potential carbon monoxide threat sitting in my utility room. Yes, we have CO detectors, including one by our bedroom. We’d probably feel better being rid of this furnace and to negotiate for a replacement that (hopefully) doesn’t have this problem. Now we’ll have to see what the company we bought the furnace from thinks about that.
Needless to say, I’m not happy. This happens more than I’d like. Crappy compressors in refrigerators are another one of my beefs. Remember those refrigerators that would last 30 years? You might still have one. Now, you are lucky if they last ten. All the while, they boast about energy efficiency. What’s efficient about making and disposing of these major appliances in such a short cycle?
What’s more troubling is that technicians know about these things, which are potentially life threatening. If my furnace were a car, there would probably be a recall. Why is that not the case?
At least it’s not January. That said, the temperatures the next few nights will be in the 30’s. We have no other heat source than an old space heater–will be going out to get another.
We may have to convert to electric one of these days. It would mean some serious rewiring in our mid-80’s house in natural gas land. It may even be a green move when we finally figure out how to generate our electricity from something else besides coal. Maybe we’ll put solar panels on our southern exposure. Cha-ching…
Meanwhile, the house is starting to get a bit chilly…
An Update:
A technician from the company from whom we bought the furnace was out this morning. One thing that impressed me was that he was far more thorough than the previous guy, pulling the blower, looking from below, above, as well as through the front via camera at the location the other tech said there was a crack. He found nothing. He ran CO and combustion tests. Nothing.
So where does that leave us?
For now, we will run the furnace. And, I changed the batteries in one CO detector, and we will add two more per his suggestions. And we may talk to a home inspection guy who is a friend to see if there is a way to get an “impartial” assessment because:
We wonder if the first company is really trying to get us to buy another furnace. We’ve dealt with them for a long time, but in recent years, we’ve noticed techs who try to get us to buy more add-ons.
We wonder if the second company doesn’t want to lose money on warranty repairs.
I should say, the second company’s tech seemed very thorough, spent a long time on the diagnostics, and didn’t charge us anything.
But all this strikes me as a parable of our “epistemic crisis.” Whose “truth” do we trust? When truth and trustworthiness has become such an expendable commodity in our communal life and everyone claims a right to their own truth, their own facts. When there is no accountability for lies or they are even considered expedient–this seeps into all of life.
Right down to those upon whom our homes and lives depend.
A (hopefully final) update
We did have a third company inspect the heat exchanger. They gave free second opinions if you had an invoice with a diagnosis of a cracked heat exchanger. I showed the tech a picture the first company sent. He said, “That’s not your heat exchanger.” But he checked everything out thoroughly.
We also installed two CO detectors, one on each floor. And a company that has had our business for thirty years has lost it. It appears they were trying to sell us a bill of goods, some of which may be reflected in the first part of this post. It’s disheartening, and left us a bit less confident in the safety of our furnace, even with those second opinions. This is what happens when trust is broken…
