Superductworkivity

Everything is connected. Remember that. It took me this long to learn it.

All right, I suspected it when I pulled a muscle in my back. (I can't remember when. If you're really curious, search through my blog yourself for the post.) Now, I have a couple other examples.

The weaker of the two examples is the scrapes on my leg. It turns out that my knees are just the right height to bump the handles on my under-sink cabinet in the bathroom, so every morning when I shave, I bang the injured spot on my knee. The scrape on my calf is just the right height to rub against my bed frame when I wake up in the morning, and against the door frame of my car when I climb out. I used to do those things every day without noticing. It was like when I strained my back, I couldn't sneeze because it hurt too much to inhale. It's just one of those things that link up that you almost never think about.

The other example is the gas lines in my condo. My neighbor informed me that I have gas again. (The plumber finally showed up yesterday.) He still doesn't know what went wrong, and he confirmed that his gas shutoff doesn't shut off my supply. He thinks air got into the line somehow. (Um, could it have happened when your el cheapo plumber screwed up?) As little as I know about home maintenance, mechanics, and general mister-fix-it-ness, I can tell him why my gas stopped, and it's exactly because of the air in the line.

Side note: when I was growing up, a bulldozer working on a highway-widening project next to our neighborhood struck a gas line. Our entire neighborhood was evacuated. My mom said, "Can't we go back in? Our house is just there at the bottom of the hill." That's when I learned from the utility guy that natural gas is heavier than air, so it sinks, so our house was the least safe place to go.

Anyhoo, the same principle applies to our gas lines. When the neighbor's plumber screwed up, he let air into the gas line. Because air is lighter than gas, the air traveled from the first-floor condo to my second-floor unit, right into my gas appliances. Whatever the plumber did yesterday, I now have gas again. Of course, it was well after I had already started reheating my frozen pot pie in the toaster oven, but at least I could boil water for my oatmeal this morning, and I'll finally grill those burgers tonight.

Ten points if you can tell me who said "superductworkivity" -- or at least in what comic strip the word appeared.

Ten more points if you can tell me who repeatedly talked about "the fundamental interconnectedness of all things".

Now, does anyone know how to relight a water heater?