Yesterday afternoon, I left the house around 4:00 p.m. to run a few errands. When I returned at 5:30, the knob on the door between the garage and the house wouldn’t turn. I knocked, thinking the door was locked, but Ted couldn’t turn the knob from the inside either. I took my bags around to the back door, then took the door knob apart to see if I could fix it. Both knobs came off, exposing the inner workings of the latch, but nothing moved and the door refused to open.

The locksmith (Kevin) who came to the house this afternoon said he rarely sees jammed latches, but this was his second one today. What are the odds? He did the same thing I had done: removed both knobs and tried to wiggle the innards. Nothing moved for him either. Luckily, he had some other tricks of the trade.

Kevin inserted flat bladders between the door and the frame, above and below the door knob. Inflating the bladders shifted the door toward the hinges, making it possible for Kevin to insert a screwdriver into the latch hole in the door frame to release the latch. I asked what he would have done if that hadn’t worked and he said, “Saw off the latch bolt. I always get them open.” I like confidence in a professional.

As he was leaving, Kevin said he was going to examine the latch because he wanted to know what jammed it so tightly. I asked him to let me know what he found, because I was curious why it worked fine at 4:00 and wouldn’t budge ninety minutes later.

In the photo below, you can see a flat gray piece of metal in the opening of the cylinder. When he took everything apart, Kevin discovered that the flat gray metal piece had broken in half. Closing the door at 4:00 p.m. yesterday apparently jiggled one of the broken pieces just enough to tip it a little inside the cylinder, preventing it from sliding back through the opening to release the latch. The unanswered question is: What broke it inside the cylinder?