National Grid, yet again: success

[redbird]

It turns out that National Grid's system thinks our building is in Brookline:

I called them again after lunch, hoping that saying "old meter number" would help. That gave this agent a hint, and she asked if there was a building lobby or management office or something. I told her we'd had to go pick up the keys elsewhere, and she asked for that address, which is in Brookline. The agent then tried our address and zip code, but with Brookline instead of Brighton (or Boston), and found it.

They will be turning the gas service on in the new place, under our name, on Friday, and turning it off here on the 22nd (I wanted an appointment after we're moving, rather than a few days before). For some reason, they have to send a technician out in a van, to drive past the building and push a button or click a link or something, which will happen sometime between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m., but nobody has to be home for that.

Comments

[readerjane]

Hooray! Glad it's worked out.

[pameladean]

Oh, good! Such a bureaucratic maze for a seemingly simple vital service.

I'd have been pleased if somebody really had sneaked in an electric stove on the sly, though.

P.

[redbird]

You'll like this, then: the apartment is heated mostly through radiators, and included in the rent.

There's also electric heat in the largest bedroom, which we will use if and when necessary. We're not sure whether they added the one heater because of the size of the room, or because it has two exterior walls. We noticed it by opening the circuit breaker box, because it includes a circuit breaker labeled "large bedroom heater."

[sine_nomine]

Perhaps it is because the radiator in that room doesn't work?

[adrian_turtle]

I've never lived with this kind of radiator, so I don't know how you have one of them broken but not the others. Doesn't the steam just run through them in series?

My current apartment is in an un-insulated masonry building, and my bedroom is in the corner. The landlord pays for baseboard heating, and it got warm...but on windy days it couldn't compete with the heat being sucked out through the walls of that room.

The little electric heater is going to be under my desk. I'm kind of looking forward to that.

[sine_nomine]

In my experience, radiators each have their own valves so you can have one, e.g., that freezes,closed without affecting the others.

I note, however, that I have not seen your particular radiators so I could be talking out my rear in this situation.

[pameladean]

I do like it! Smuggling in an electric heater is probably easier than smuggling in a stove, to be sure.

Nice to have some kind of backup in case of a gas outage, too, though those are generally less common than electrical ones.

P.

[redbird]

I think our backup for that is the microwave oven.

[vass]

Something between congratulations and omfg.