It’s a good night for grilling.

By the time he brought the food inside, he was soaked.

After an entire month of a non-stop heatwave, I was ready for relief. Our nights hadn’t even gone below eighty for the last month. We weren’t even able to enjoy the pool unless we waited until after dark when the air cooled off. The pool water felt more like bath water, but at least it could cool us off enough to sleep. I refused to change the temperature on the thermostat. I knew the rule of keeping the house about fifteen degrees below the outside temperature. I wouldn’t let anyone touch the thermostat in the house. I set the thermostat at seventh-five, and I would not budge with that setting.. They weren’t happy with me, but they agreed to my request. Now that the temperatures have cooled off, we are all much happier. We even decided that it would be a good night to do some grilling. I bought steaks and some potatoes that were begging to be baked in the grill. I couldn’t believe how quickly the skies clouded up, and it rained. My husband refused to leave the steaks. He stood by the grill with an umbrella over his head and the grill. By the time he brought the food inside, he was soaked. The second the air conditioning hit him, he shivered. I got him a towel, but he told me it was the first time in over a month that he realized the air conditioning was even on. My kids thought this was funny and even I had to smile. I knew they were poking fun at me for my being so rigid over the thermostat.

Click for more

There is Halloween candy on the shelves.

It is barely August, and yet I saw Halloween candy in our local grocery store.

At first, I thought maybe it was old inventory that was on sale, but nope, I was wrong.

Halloween is a holiday that should be held when it is cooler outside. No one should be thinking about Halloween candy when it is still in the upper eighties during the day. All I can think about is the air conditioning that was waiting for me when I got home. My daughter wanted to spend some time looking at the Halloween costumes. I just wanted to get my groceries and head home. I was hoping my ice cream didn’t melt on the way from the store to the car, or from the car to the house. I knew I had the air conditioning on at home and I wanted to get there as quickly as possible. I was anxious to get there for the safety of my groceries and for our comfort. I quickly got our groceries into the refrigerator and freezer, only to hear my daughter complaining about how hot it was in the house. I was so worried about the groceries that I didn’t even take notice that the air conditioning wasn’t working. I hit the thermostat, but nothing was happening. I put in a phone call to the HVAC company and I told my daughter we were going back to the store. She wanted to know if we were going to look at the Halloween costumes and buy some candy? I told her yes, knowing we were going to enjoy their air conditioning while waiting three hours for our AC service technician to tell us he was on the way to our house..

Air conditioner install

Trying to stay comfortable with no working A/C system

We were all so happy to see the man and everybody actually cheered

It was a difficult time when I had family come to visit from out of state. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy their company, it’s that my cooling system broke down during the middle of their visit. I called the HVAC company, but they said they couldn’t have an HVAC technician out until the following day. Now, I did manage to find my old window A/C unit that I had in my attic space, but it didn’t help all that much. I installed it but the small amount of A/C coming from it was not quite enough to make everybody feel comfortable. I mean it was better than nothing, and we also had some fans, but we were all still sweating inside of the house. Finally, we decided to go to some places where we knew they had good air conditioning. One place we went to was the science museum. I absolutely loved that place because the temperature control settings were always on point and the air quality was wonderful. We all had a good time, but we couldn’t stay at the science museum all day. Eventually, we went to a buffet and we spent numerous hours there. We weren’t looking forward to going back to the overheated household, but eventually we had no choice. I had hoped that the HVAC technician would arrive in the morning hours, but he ended up showing in the afternoon hours. We were all so happy to see the man and everybody actually cheered. He said he felt honored because he never had that kind of greeting coming onto a job before. He did a great job with the A/C system and we were all comfortable after that.

 

HVAC equipment

I don’t really get what I give

There’s a reason why I don’t have all that many friends in my life.

It’s really because all the friends I have had always try to take advantage in some type of way.

Even if I get friends to help me out with something, they always immediately expect something in return. I did have a friend help me fix my HVAC system once, but then he wanted me to take him for a long ride so that he could visit his sister. I had to be there with him and it was not an enjoyable experience. His sister was nice and all but she had terrible air quality in her home and she didn’t have good temperature control settings. Seriously, it was like 82 degrees in her house and she thought that was comfortable. She had an A/C system too, but she didn’t seem to believe in using it. Other than that, I have had all kinds of friends try to get free rides to places, and I always had a bunch of people trying to hang out at my place and enjoy my air conditioning system. In the winter, people loved to relax in front of my fireplace while using all of my firewood that I worked so hard to stack before the winter months. When it comes down to it, I just can’t stand most people and I don’t feel like I need anybody’s help in my life. It seems like I have always given more than I have gotten, and it’s just not worth it for me any longer.

 

furnace/heater installation

I decided to try doing the furnace tune-up on my own

My wife kept getting on my case about calling up the HVAC company when we were in the fall season. I kept putting it off because I didn’t think we could afford to have that done. Then I had the crazy idea to handle the HVAC tune-up on my own. I thought how hard could it be? I actually remember watching the HVAC technician take care of the tune-up before and it didn’t seem to be all that difficult. He basically made sure to clean out the inner workings of the furnace, he cleaned out the burners, and he tested everything to make sure the burners were showing a blue color. He also made sure to check for any carbon monoxide leaks. Well, we have carbon monoxide detectors and I figured it couldn’t be all that difficult to clean the inside components of the furnace. So I got to work on the HVAC to see that I could take care of the tune-up. I realized that I was not good at this type of work and it felt like it was dangerous. I did have the power shut down to the HVAC unit, but I still felt nervous like I was going to mess something up. After a long time of cleaning out everything and then testing the furnace, I was happy when I saw nothing but blue flames. Once I was able to figure everything out, I actually felt more confident in my ability to handle the furnace tune-up. I certainly am no HVAC professional, but I think I can take care of future tune-ups.
Air conditioner install

I have a grouchy husband, but he takes care of things

Even though my husband is grouchy all of the time, he actually is a great husband.

He takes care of everything around the house.

If there is a problem with a drain in the house, he is able to get the drain working great again. If there is a broken door or if there is a hold in the wall, he knows how to fix those things. If the tiles are worn out on the floor, he knows how to replace the tiles. If there is anything wrong with the HVAC system, he is able to take care of that. He really takes great care of the HVAC system by keeping up with the air filter changes and he also cleans out the inner workings of the HVAC system on a regular basis. I am so thankful that he always takes care of all of these things. He even went and signed up for an HVAC service plan. With the HVAC service plan, he has the HVAC technicians coming out every quarter to do necessary maintenance and tune-ups on the HVAC system. Between my husband keeping everything clean and those HVAC workers staying on top of everything else, we never have any issues. As a matter of fact, our energy bills are always really low because of that regular HVAC system maintenance. I just wish that he wasn’t so grumpy all the time. He gets so angry over the smallest things like if he can’t find the TV remote or if he needs to get some socks on and he doesn’t know where they are. I still love him no matter what though.

 

a/c representative

My friend didn’t like my ductless mini split until I told him about the benefits

I wasn’t really sure what kind of HVAC system I wanted to upgrade to, so I had an HVAC technician come over to help me decide.

  • After talking with him about various HVAC system options, he ended up recommending the ductless mini split.

When he told me about how energy efficient these HVAC systems are, I was entirely sold. When I learned about HVAC zone control though, that made me even more excited about the new HVAC installation. You can have several units in different zones up to as many as 8 zones running off of a single outdoor condenser unit. These ductless mini splits are highly advanced and they are perfect because they don’t require any ductwork. I was told by the HVAC professional that traditional central HVAC systems lose a great deal of energy with the air flowing through the ductwork system. So when I had my ductless mini split installed, I was easily impressed and enjoying my new HVAC. When I had my best friend over though, he actually had the nerve to say that my new HVAC wasn’t a good look. He asked me why I wouldn’t just stick with a regular central air HVAC. I had to explain to him what I learned from the HVAC technician. I told him about the huge energy savings with a ductless mini split. Then I told him about the HVAC zone control and how much energy I would save with that. I also told him about the huge amount of energy you waste with traditional ductwork. By the time we were done talking, he wanted a new ductless mini split just like mine!

a/c repairman

My buddy became jealous quickly about my smart thermostat

I thought it was amusing when I gave my buddy my old programmable thermostat.

  • He was thankful at first because he used one of those old dial thermostats.

The programmable thermostats are great because you can save big money by keeping your HVAC on a certain schedule. Once it’s programmed, you don’t have to spend time adjusting the temperature control settings. Not to mention, you can have the temperature control settings just right for when you get back home from work. The thing is, I learned about smart thermostats and so I decided to upgrade. I figured my buddy would appreciate having a nicer thermostat than what he had, but he seemed disappointed when he learned that I had a fancy smart thermostat. He actually was jealous when he learned what a smart thermostat can actually do. I am able to set up geofencing which triggers the temperature control settings to go to minimal levels when I leave my house. The smart thermostat has learned my preferred temperature control settings, so it’s on an automatic schedule just the way I like. It’s great because I didn’t even have to program the smart thermostat. The most wonderful thing is that I am able to adjust the temperature control settings with my phone, and my buddy really is jealous about that. The one thing I’m not sure I want to tell him is the fact that I save roughly 10% on my energy bills. I think if he learned about that, he might actually be angry at me for not telling him about smart thermostats when I got one for myself.

Air vent

I’m glad that my cousin was finally able to get with the times

When I was at my cousin’s house, he was telling me about how he got this awesome new programmable thermostat.

  • He was really proud of that thermostat, but it seemed like he didn’t realize that smart thermostats were the new thing.

I wasn’t sure that I wanted to tell him about it, I wanted him to be able to enjoy his new purchase without feeling bad. He said that he always wanted a programmable thermostat so that he could save money. Then eventually when he came to visit at my house, he noticed my smart thermostat. It was funny because he actually asked me what kind of programmable thermostat that was. I told him it was a smart thermostat, and his jaw dropped. He said he had never heard of smart thermostats and asked me how they worked. I explained that a smart thermostat actually learns your preferred temperature control settings. This basically means that you can have it programmed without actually having to program it. When I told him I could adjust the temperature control settings remotely with my smartphone, he was amazed. What really got him though was the fact that you can save up to 10% on your energy bills when you use a smart thermostat. It was crazy because he actually went out and bought a new smart thermostat instead of using his relatively new programmable thermostat. I think the energy savings really sold him on getting a smart thermostat like mine, but he really was impressed by all the features. I’m glad that he was able to get with the times.

gas furnace

I kept purchasing the same window A/C unit my brother bought me a long time ago

When I was younger, my brother bought me this really nice window A/C unit.

I always thought it was the greatest gift of all time.

I kept that window A/C unit for the longest time, even when I moved into my first apartment. I was actually sad when it finally died on me. Because I loved that old window A/C unit so much, I decided to purchase the same window A/C unit. My brother would come visit me on occasion and he would always smile when he saw that I was using that same window A/C unit. He honestly thought that the old window A/C unit was still working and I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I had replaced his old window A/C unit when it died. It became pretty funny over the years because eventually I had to replace the window A/C unit again, and I went for the same old window A/C unit model. My brother was wondering how that window A/C unit lasted so long, and I told him it was some kind of miracle cooling technology. He was saying that he wished he had purchased himself one of those window A/C units. He figured they didn’t make those anymore, and he’s right, they don’t. But whenever I need to get a new window A/C unit, I try to find that same used model. I just have an attachment to that particular window A/C unit, and I guess it’s because it was a sentimental gift from my brother.

heating business