Rainbow

My first indication was the feel of cold tiles on my feet Saturday morning.  I wasn't alarmed as much as wondering why they felt quite so cold.  The rest of the house was warm enough.  The house is built to pick up a lot of passive solar heating and that day was sunny.  Once the sun went down though I could feel a temperature drop.  I went into the utility room.    The pipe that fed down from the heater into the floor felt cold.   The heater wasn't working.   It was another relatively sunny day on Sunday but, once again, after sunset the house took on a chill.   I called Winco Heating and A/C in the morning.  Andy said he could stop by that afternoon.   Parts or replacement of an electric heater are expensive but I was more concerned that tariffs might also make them hard to obtain.   On the other hand, it is the end of April.   I suppose I could manage w/o heat now.   While we might still have some frosts, the  house wasn't in danger of freezing.  Andy arrived and found the problem quickly.  The system was low on fluid.  He fixed it w/ a hose and bucket.  According to his records the last time he had serviced the system was 2019 so he didn't think there was a leak - just normal usage loss.   We agreed though that he would put me on his annual fall checkup list.  I'm on off-peak heating which means the house heating system doesn't come on until 8 p.m. and it will take awhile after for the house to heat up.   In addition a big storm was blowing in all day so no temp bump from sunlight streaming through the windows.    By 7 p.m. it felt colder inside the house than outside.  Glad I didn't opt to 'tough it out' w/o heat.  In fact, think I'll take a nice hot shower, turn on the electric blanket, and go to bed where I can watch the storm blow through.  Tomorrow will be warmer.