Apparently I jinxed the boiler

[louisedennis]

The plumber turned up out of the blue to do some final checks and fill in some paperwork and apparently the whole caboodle is kaput in some mysterious fashion relating to the number 8.

This entry was originally posted at http://purplecat.dreamwidth.org/95791.html.

Comments

[knitekat]

*grr* Bloody annoying. What has the number 8 got to do with it?

[louisedennis]

8 may be the error code for the fault (which apparently means the fan is jammed) except that the 8 is not appearing where the plumber expects it to appear, where a number 3 is displayed, however 3 isn't an official error code. But since the plumber was a bit suspicious about the fan when he installed the boiler he's opting for problem type 8. The poor man was very put out, apparently this is his favourite make of boiler and he's taking the malfunction as a personal slight.

[king_pellinor]

Is there an error in the error-reporting system, then?

3 is just 8 minus 1, after all.

[louisedennis]

3 is just 8 minus 1, after all.

I can think of a few ways this might be the case, I'm now wondering which you are thinking of.

[king_pellinor]

How LCDs often show numbers.

I can't think of any others, I'm now wondering what you're thinking of :-)

[louisedennis]

I thought of the LCD one, but also that 8 minus 1 is 7 which number bonds with 3 to 10 - though I couldn't quite make that one work. I also messed around with different bases for bit - in binary if you take away a 1 from 3 and add three zeros you get 8 but that seemed even less plausible than the number bond one - in base 4 eight minus 1 is 13 but I thought I was maybe beginning to overthink things at that point.

[king_pellinor]

I was wondering about different bases, and maybe using a modulus, but I couldn't get it to work with only a minus 1.

[knitekat]

Ah. Well if he's put out and taking it as a personal slight, hopefully he'll fix it quickly.