Gas, Cognac and Vacuums: Sweeping Up the Mail Residue

In defending myself against charges of intemperance in a crisis for having a bottle of cognac in my earthquake kit, I mentioned that I certainly had no intention of taking a nip from it until after my wife had turned off the gas valve and taken care of whatever other emergency actions might be required.

I see now that this might be offensive to women who would find my attitude sexist, to say the least, especially considering Jennifer Morrison Taw’s disaffection over our old rule that my wife was not to run the vacuum cleaner while I was working.

Once again, I plead that I was only being ironic. It is true, however, that my wife has always had a sort of knack, not to say a gift, for plumbing, and if the gas valve were to be turned off after a quake, I think it would be better left to her experienced hand.

Much more serious, I find out, was giving publicity to the notion that one should turn off the gas valve immediately after an earthquake.

I have a letter from Dick Friend of the Southern California Gas Co. which seeks to disabuse me of that notion. Friend takes a rather ironic tone himself in approaching the subject.

“I can’t agree with you more on your steadfast promise to Lois R. Koch (‘I won’t touch the cognac until after my wife has shut off the gas valve. . . .’)

“Because if Mrs. Smith does just that, and it’s cold outside, you’ll need the cognac to survive the elements. Once you shut off the gas at the meter, you should not turn it on until a gas company person (or a licensed plumber) has checked out the pipes (in the house, not yours).

“After the Whittier quake, 21,000 persons ran out, wrenches in hand, and turned off their gas systems. It took us an entire week to get around to turning them all back on. There is no official record, but there probably was a record amount of cognac, and vodka, and beer, consumed while they waited for the gas to come back on in their homes.�

Friend advises that you do not shut off your gas valve unless you hear or smell gas escaping (which is unlikely). He also advises strapping your water heater to a stud, so that it won’t topple over in a quake. “Should it fall, it not only could break the gas and water connectors, but it could spill 30 or 40 gallons of precious water which might be all you’ll have for a day or two. It may be more valuable than the cognac.�

Irony or not, that sounds like good advice.

Meanwhile, I’d like to say one more thing about vacuum cleaners. My feeling that they’re disagreeable is substantiated by Pat Warren of San Diego, who says they’re also dangerous.

“I am a 46-year-old housewife who also owns a stained glass repair business,� she writes. “The latter has me up and down on ladders and scaffolds, windowsills and ledges. I repair much of the glass in place, which also has me climbing on roofs, crawling in basements and finding myself in various strange positions while I work. I play racquetball three times a week for fun and coach a high school girls soccer team during the winter semester.

“The only injury that I’ve ever had occurred last Thanksgiving while I was vacuuming the living room in preparation for the festivities. Twisted my knee and it hasn’t been the same since. It may require surgery if time, Motrin and physical therapy don’t do their jobs soon.�

Can you blame me for refusing to use the things? I do hope that high on the priority list of research and development teams is a robot vacuum cleaner that doesn’t make any noise.

Maybe vacuum cleaners can be made to respond to electronic control, as foreseen for other appliances by the Japanese. Then we could simply telephone home and tell the vacuum cleaner to do the living room.

I’ll bet that would cut down so much on domestic stress that we wouldn’t have half as many divorces as marriages anymore.

By the way. For the next three weeks my wife and I will be traveling in Egypt and Israel.

I don’t know how to say so long in hieroglyphics, so sayonara.