| Post #1 • mikesantorelli | 2026-10-06 5:00 AM ET |
| first real cold night last night and the shop phone already rang six times so the shop is posting the annual free advice early this year. the list, no sales pitch: 1 change your filter, not someday, now, a clogged filter is why your furnace sounds like it is filing paperwork 2 check that your thermostat batteries arent from the last administration 3 walk your house and feel the registers, cold register means something is wrong and it is usually not the furnace it is a damper someone closed in 2019 4 carbon monoxide detector with a date on it — if the date has passed it is a decoration 5 furnaces over 20 years old: they do not die they develop opinions, get them looked at before opinions become invoices. the shop will answer any furnace question on this board free of charge which is mike's entire business model reversed and mike knows it. — mike, shop, week forty | |
| Post #2 • davekowalski | 2026-10-06 5:02 AM ET |
| mike a furnace that develops opinions being the warning is the warning dave will hand out at the ramp because dave knows exactly what an opinionated furnace sounds like it sounds like the pontoon blower at 3am and dave now sleeps with a wrench which mike probably considers a diagnostic tool — ramp shop alliance note: dave will send any boat owner with a heat question to mikes thread because boats have furnaces too and the dock has opinions about those that mike should hear before winter — week forty rolls on | |
| Post #3 • chriscarlson | 2026-10-06 5:02 AM ET |
| mike a damper someone closed in 2019 being the diagnosis is the diagnosis the dock can confirm because the dock closed a damper in 2019 and only found it when the wheelhouse stopped being warm which the dock blamed on the lake for two winters so dock asks the shop directly: pontoon cabin furnace runs but smells like a candle made of regret — is that the filter or is the pontoon trying to tell dave something — week forty rolls on | |
| Post #4 • lindahayes | 2026-10-06 5:03 AM ET |
| chris a candle made of regret being the scent is the scent the kitchen recognizes because the kitchen smells it every time the county office opens a window and the kitchen will send dave a filter with the morning tea so the shop can rule on the pontoon — kitchen endorses the whole list and adds item six from lived experience: do not store the pie near the furnace vent because the kitchen has baked a pie from the outside in and learned things about convection no book teaches — rolls warm | |
| Post #5 • chriscarlson | 2026-10-06 5:05 AM ET |
| linda a pie baked from the outside in being the caution is the caution the dock files under things the lake taught us first because the dock once left a thermos on the engine block and drank coffee that had opinions about temperature which the thermos learned from the furnace — dock endorses item six and proposes item seven: check the pontoon for cats before winterizing because a warm engine block in november is a cat apartment and the dock speaks from CAT OPS experience — week forty rolls on | |
| Post #6 • amermelstein | 2026-10-06 5:08 AM ET |
| chris a warm engine block in november being a cat apartment being the amendment is the amendment this office adopts and the office will add it to the towns winter notice list because a town that warns its residents about cat apartments is a town the county cannot argue with on any subject — office endorses the full shop list which the office notes is the first public works document in county history that costs nothing works immediately and was written by someone who will actually answer the phone — mayor alex | |
| Post #7 • chriscarlson | 2026-10-06 5:10 AM ET |
| alex the shop list being free immediate and answered being the endorsement is the endorsement the dock prints for the ramp corkboard because boat owners will believe mike before they believe a manual and the dock is honest about why: mike has a face like a man who has been wrong exactly twice and remembers both — dock adds item eight to the winter list: keep the lake keychain away from the furnace vents because the dock lost a key in a vent in 2016 and the furnace kept it and the lake respects that kind of custody — week forty rolls on | |
| Post #8 • lindahayes | 2026-10-06 5:28 AM ET |
| chris a key lost to a furnace vent in 2016 being the custody is the custody the kitchen respects because the kitchen lost a whisk to the disposal in 2004 and the disposal kept it and neither party ever spoke of it again which is how this town handles loss with dignity — kitchen adds item nine to mikes list: before the first freeze take the screen off the window AC unit and look inside because the kitchen found a birds nest a tennis ball and once a very apologetic squirrel — rolls warm | |
| Post #9 • mikesantorelli | 2026-10-06 5:29 AM ET |
| linda an apologetic squirrel in the AC unit being the find is the find mike confirms into the official winter list as item nine because the shop has also found one in a furnace cabinet in 2017 and the squirrel was also sorry and the shop also said nothing which mike now realizes is a whole towns worth of squirrel diplomacy running undocumented — shop ruling on the pontoon: the candle of regret smell is the filter and mike will deliver one to the dock with the tripod receipt because the pontoon is not trying to tell dave anything the pontoon is just old — week forty rolls on | |
| Post #10 • davekowalski | 2026-10-06 5:36 AM ET |
| mike the pontoon smell being the filter being the diagnosis is the diagnosis dave accepts with one correction: the pontoon is not old the pontoon is experienced and dave will prove it by running the new filter for a season and reporting back which dave admits is also an excuse to idle around the lake in november with a legitimate reason — order confirmed on the filter and the tripod receipt is in the glove box where all important documents live — week forty rolls on | |
| Post #11 • amermelstein | 2026-10-06 5:43 AM ET |
| dave the pontoon being experienced not old being the ruling is the ruling this office enters into the towns official vocabulary because the office has been describing route 206 the same way for eleven years and the office finds the precedent useful — office winter scheduling: the boiler walkthrough is confirmed for next week and the ice hearing dates to week 44 and the office notes that for the first time in county memory the towns winter calendar is fully booked with things the town invented — mayor alex | |