New Above

What’s in your attic? In ours, it’s a new Ruud 5-ton furnace, complete with fan drive. (This is the important bit - read on.) About 8.30 Wednesday night, the air conditioning system gave a mortal groan…and stopped. Our a/c went u/s…out of service. Kaput. Joined the Choir Invisible.

Thursday here it was 105°F. For two days, the temperature in the house rose in direct proportion to the day’s heat index and beyond. On Friday afternoon, it was actually cooler outside than inside.

Makes you wonder how William Faulkner actually got any writing done, back in the drip-sweat-on-the-paper days before home air conditioning. I didn’t, much; which is probably why I’m a somewhat-known ad-guy instead of a famous novelist.

Fortunately, our long-time HVAC service company, Sun Air Conditioning & Heating, came out on Thursday afternoon. Unfortunately, after a lot of banging about, Richard Socha (the Sun service tech) made his way down our rickety ladder bearing an immense double-shafted electric motor with two blowers attached. Further unfortunately, the manufacturer of this particular apparatus itself went belly up about five years ago. Replacement unit not available. We were double-shafted ourselves.

Thursday evening was not comfortable. It took three Martinis to get me into a soaking sleep. But the Sun team came out again on Friday with our new upstairs thing. It took three of them to hoist the thing up into the attic. And by 5P, we were back in business. In my case, you should take that literally.

Thursday and Friday were the times that try men’s souls. Barbara wasn’t too happy either. And yes, it took a certain level of…investment…to get ourselves back into the comfort zone.

Thanks to Sun, we're once again the height of cool. A good thing, too: above 100°F, photographic film (remember that?) turns reddish. The coatings of pills melt. The energy starts to drain from batteries. Barbara glows. Richard sweats all over the keyboard. That’s just plain Ruud.

Photo of a completely different but decorative piece of machinery by Sten Porse, Jutland, from www.commons.wikimedia.org. With thanks.