One of the things I wasn’t looking forward to about this house was the location of the washer and dryer. The hookups for them are literally UNDER the basement stairs. You all know me, I’m tall. There’s technically enough space to stand there, but I really didn’t like the idea of standing under the stairs to do my laundry. So when I bought my washer and dryer, I started asking about shifting them, not a lot, just 4 feet or so to the right – enough that they’re not under the stairs. And it turns out it’s not even that far, just about 2 feet for the washer, and then maybe 4 for the dryer. This meant that I got the machines delivered, but not installed, because I knew I’d need to use a longer dryer vent, washer hoses, drain, and power cords to be able to put them where I wanted. I got the cords and all in advance, and then waited for the machines.
They got delivered in the middle of the day last Wednesday, and when I finally had time on Friday to start installing, I discovered that the standard hookups for the washer worked fine – hot water hose to the red-handled spicket, cold to the blue one, drain into standpipe, cord into wall outlet – and all I’d need was a longer dryer vent. Off I went to return the other cords and acquire the vent. Of course, I didn’t actually open the provided dryer cord to confirm that it was long enough, so on Saturday when I got around to installing the dryer, I discovered that the standard cord is 4 feet long. It was maybe 3 inches too short to let me put the dryer where I wanted. So I went back to the store and re-acquired a 6 foot dryer cord, which then allowed me to install the dryer properly.
And then I went upstairs to grab my basket of dirty laundry and realized that I didn’t have any detergent. And decided that maybe painting my bedroom was more important than doing laundry right that moment.
On Monday, I finally bought detergent, and triumphantly started my washing machine for the first time. No leaks, everything sounded good, and I was happy. Until I took my first load of clothes out to move them to the dryer, and they were awfully… warm. I’d washed them on cold, as I always do, and yet… warm. A quick test of the basement sink and some tracing of pipes leads me to discover – that blue-handled spicket? Definitely the hot water pipe. Cursing at the previous inhabitants of the house for labeling things so wrongly, I grab my pliers and unscrew the hose – about half a turn, which is when I realize the spicket is still on, and now there’s water spraying me and the wall and the outlet that’s about 4 inches from the hose, and I manage to drop the pliers (metal on concrete floor is LOUD), but get the spicket turned off, and go find a bucket to set under the hoses while I switch them, which works fine, and then the hoses are right, and I make yet another mental note about the house: check which pipes are which before you connect stuff to them. Even if they’re labeled.