The AC Guide

I have no idea what it is about my core group of friends and I, however I swear we’re connected by the same cosmic energy.

If one person feels severely low and unmotivated, it’s guaranteed that we’re all feeling that way.

If one member has a legitimately good week, my friend and I all feel like we’re walking on air. Unfortunately, if one of us is struck with bad luck, it’s almost a no-brainer that we’re all going to experience the same misfortune. That’s why I legitimately shouldn’t have been surprised last month, when one by one my friend and I all reported having a slight change on the same general problem; our HVAC systems. It started when my neighbor Alicia told me that her entire furnace wouldn’t turn on one afternoon because their heat had still not switched over. She was chilly, but they made it through the mild winter nights. Next, my good neighbor in Kentucky told me that her car’s heating system stopped laboring one afternoon, so she had to drive to labor blind in the chilly outdoor air. It was maybe two nights before our good pal Beau begrudgingly told us that his own radiator had malfunctioned at his apartment. He was without heat during a cold snap of midwest winter, and had to set up a dozen space boilers to keep his cats alive that weekend. Well, it should have come at truly no surprise to me when I woke up the other afternoon and my whole home was chilly cold. I could see my breath as I exclaimed loud dissatisfaction. Sure enough, when I walked down the hall to the control unit, the central furnace had powered off at least 12 hours before.

New contractor

Well, things sure are feeling hot and heavy right now.

Hot, in the fact that there is a lot of steam passing around between my family members, and heavy in the way that my stomach feels every time I get another harassing message from my mother, and you see, this year for the first time, my significant other and I are not travelling to see our respective family members in their far-off locations.

My family resides 730 miles north in the brutal cold and snow of the midwest. My boyfriend’s family lives in the opposite direction, 600 miles south in the heat and humidity of FL. My good friend and I reside somewhere in between, torn between the two battling teams. This year instead of trying to please pretty much everyone and killing ourselves, my friend and I decided to just stay put in our modern home together. I knew that the decision wouldn’t be accepted warmly, however I didn’t know that pretty much everyone would get so hot under the collar. My family was instantly bribing, with my mother telling me that the chilly air temperature wouldn’t be so terrible this year because she had recently substituted her heater. The central heat undoubtedly works this year, she exclaimed! Surely, my friend and I want to come up and inspect her brand modern smart control unit and forced air heater! My boyfriend’s family, on the other hand, has been nothing but cold… Rather than bragging about their indoor temperature control measures, they’ve totally frozen us out. Ice cold. Neither situation is ideal, however I know that our relaxed plans, heightened indoor comfort, and outdoor air temperature is going to make up for all the family heat.

Heat pump install

I have a real bone to pick with my job these days.

• They have really dropped the hammer on people working from home, plus it has put me in quite a salty mood.

Here, I was under the impression that I could do my data entry work from home, plus instead they are insistent that I kneel in this uncomfortable office with a million distractions all afternoon long. I really love working from the comfort of my own home, plus I am one of those people who can’t get the same level of productivity accomplished from an unnatural environment. The extreme fluorescent lighting of the office, along with the excruciating air temperature control, really kills me. Every afternoon I’m sizzling or cold in there, plus there’s some sort of weird smell emanating from the air ducts it seems. I can’t rest it in there plus I work as fast as I can to reach fresh air again. The other afternoon, but, I approached work a little differently plus made a immense discovery about the Heating, Ventilation plus A/C system. I got to work super late in the night, plus found that the whole office was empty plus the Heating, Ventilation plus A/C system was turned off. I went to the thermostat plus reset all the controls to my exact temperature preferences, basking in my freedom. I didn’t expect much from the air temperature control system, however soon enough, my little office was ideally heated plus the air felt fresh. There were no weird smells plus the temperature didn’t fluctuate wildly throughout my shift. This terrible heating plus cooling system works just good – it’s my coworkers that make the place so miserable.

Heat pump service

However, this grumpy old guy just thinks I’m a groaning plus moaning millennial with no leg to rest on

It’s a pretty bleak outlook when most people you know is highly educated, independently brilliant, plus somehow working 3 mediocre jobs trying to get by. This is the curse of my generation, I suppose, plus we’re all in this together to some extent. That being said, I’m really tired of this particular curse already, plus I have a long time in the working world ahead of me. At this point, I work a full time job plus two part time gigs just trying to support myself – literally just trying to keep warm through the winter. These days, my eighth job is actually serving to pay off my ungodly energy costs every month, because lord knows I can’t afford to live in a well insulated home with a working Heating, Ventilation plus A/C system. Instead, I reside in a tiny little ramshackle home, a solid 45 minute commute from the city, plus barely make enough currency to pay for rent plus my yearly utilities. The heating plus cooling system, alone, takes well over 20% of my check several months. Think about that – the cost of keeping a one study room home warm through the winter time plus relatively cool through the summer time is a eighth of my income. I’ve tried having the landlord inspect the Heating, Ventilation plus A/C system, because clearly there is a major issue with the efficiency of the heating plus cooling equipment, if not the air air duct itself. However, this grumpy old guy just thinks I’m a groaning plus moaning millennial with no leg to rest on. I can tell you, if my energy expenditure doesn’t improve, soon I really won’t have an arm or a leg.

hvac worker

I swear to god, my Grandmother is one of the most demanding plus entitled humans alive, but she is regularly insisting that people drop everything plus attend to her every whim; not because she’s too aged to be capable, however simply because that’s who she’s regularly been; Her entire life has been managed by other people looking out for her, plus without my Grandpa around, she counts very on my mother plus her other daughters, then if it isn’t one thing, it’s another.

Even when she packs up plus moves to FL to endure the cold winters, no one is free from her reign of terror.

In fact, she very managed to make it worse from a distance this year! Apparently my Aunt made the mistake of having a smart temperature control installed in my Grandma’s property last year! My Grandma was regularly complaining that she didn’t know if the property was okay or the heat was staying on, so my Aunt decided to provide her the means to monitor the indoor air quality from 1000 miles away… Unfortunately, my Grandma doesn’t have much else to keep her busy when she’s out lounging in the FL sunlight each winter, and this means, she wound up using the smart temperature control app on her phone roughly 10 times a morning. She regularly monitored the air temperature in her property up north plus modified the boiler settings to compensate for perceived air quality changes… Fast forward to two weeks into her seasonal trip, plus her aged boiler was broken down; Not only did the smart temperature control create even more obsessive material for my Grandma, however my Dad had to go handle the professional Heating plus Air Conditioning appointment plus upgrade of a whole new central boiler without so much as a “thanks.”

 

mini split air conditioner

I am not an expert on any topic surrounding construction or home renovation, that is for sure.

I’ve only lived in a house for about a year, and I’m still trying to figure out what is important when you’re a homeowner.

What I can say, is the importance of finding someone reputable who does know a thing or two about home infrastructure and maintenance. I couldn’t be happier with the contractor that we chose during our big home renovation last year. He was professional, highly knowledgeable, and had a great crew to work with. From the moment that we signed the contract with him, I knew we made the right choice. Not only was he an expert on additions and floor plans, but he knew more about HVAC systems than anyone I’ve ever met. From the get-go, I had no idea how we were going to run heating and cooling into the new home addition. He was extremely confident that we could find a ventilation for the small, oddly-shaped space, and began to talk to us about mini-cut ductless HVAC systems. At that point, it seemed like the ideal temperature control solution for our new space, however, the world had a different idea. About two weeks into the construction project, a massive piece of timber smashed the life out of our AC unit in the backyard. The contractor was so apologetic for the accident and insisted he would resolve the indoor temperature problem. Well, unbeknownst to us, his brother worked in the HVAC field. He made a sweetheart deal with his brother, replaced our entire cooling system with a highly updated model, and even ran air ducts into the new addition before we even knew what was happening. Now our renovation is complete, and we never even had to buy ventilation equipment!

 

Commercial HVAC provider

It’s really funny these days, living in a major metropolis.

• I have to say that I’m genuinely intimidated by the level of activity and number of humans who live here most of the time.

I do my best to blend in, but everything is pretty overwhelming to me. Where I grew up, you see, we had a population of 7000 people and a lot of corn fields. We literally had one stoplight in my town. “Bring your tractor to school day” was a huge event at my high school. Needless to say, it wasn’t a bustling town. In fact, the biggest event that the town ever held was the annual Settler’s Days weekend. It included a small fair and amusement rides, as well as a sad parade. The only thing was, our town wasn’t even equipped with the infrastructure for these basic necessities! Every year, the town suffered huge power outages when the carnival got going. Every year, we lost all air conditioning for at least 4 days. Whenever the power went out, so did our ability to modify the indoor air quality at home. The temperature was usually well into the 80s, so it was a considerable problem without central cooling at home. We would arrive home from the little festival on the first night, only to find the house was dark, burning hot and humid. There was no point in calling an HVAC professional or even fiddling with the AC unit ourselves, because we didn’t own a backup generator to get power. Each year we just had to accept it was going to be a long, hot, and sleepless weekend without any air conditioning. Eventually, we started leaving town entirely, fleeing to operational central cooling systems during the big event weekend.

Commercial AC

I am currently at the end of my rope with work.

I swear to you, I work all day, every day without breaks.

When I lay down to sleep at night, my work issues follow me to bed. I lay awake and worry about what I’m doing right and wrong, and all the tasks I need to complete immediately. I don’t think I can keep up with this level of stress, so I’m looking to make a big career transition. Honestly, I didn’t know what field I wanted to go into for a long time, so I remained in the same tortuous position for several years after this realization. But as of last week, I truly feel like the world delivered me a solution. I was driving home, stressed as usual, when I got caught in traffic right in front of a brand new trades school. They had advertisements outside for all sorts of new HVAC programs that were under development, and I was immediately interested in what the heating and cooling industry would look like. After that, I got online and started looking for more information on the new ventilation certification. Soon, I found that there were more option in the heating and cooling field than being a simple HVAC journeyman servicing local residences. In fact, it is possible to be an expert in the field of commercial HVAC inspection for public places and large corporate institutions! The job entails traveling to important locations, accessing the current heating and cooling plan, and running diagnostics to determine if the HVAC system was up to date or in need of routine maintenance. In this position, I will have far less work to do and more freedom to make my own schedule. I’m excited to meet local business owners and contribute to their high quality indoor air.

Cooling and heating business

I thought the whole thing was pretty strange and the usual HVAC man must have been off-duty, but it got weirder the next day when I saw housekeeping

I rarely get to go out or see the world, since my finances are really quite tight. That’s why I saved up for 5 years to afford an amazing holiday, celebrating my quiet life successes with my loyal dog. Everything about the trip was glorious and awe-inspiring… except for the hotel where we got stranded for a few days. You see, we were driving through the mountains when my car started acting up. I pulled over into a hotel for the night, figuring I would address the mechanical issues in the morning. When I checked into my room, however, it was clear that I wouldn’t be well rested for the ordeal. I opened the door, and a blast of hot air rushed past me. I went to the small heating and cooling device tucked under the window, and adjusted the AC to maximum power before going out to get some dinner. When I arrived, I was unpleasantly surprised to find that the room was even hotter and more humid than before! At this point, I realized it was time to contact the front desk about my air conditioning unit. I went to the front desk and asked the clerk about my HVAC device, to which he replied that a maintenance worker would be right up. I waited patiently for about two hours before someone arrived, but when I opened the door I was in for a surprise. The front desk clerk was now standing at my room, except he was wearing coveralls and carrying a toolbox. He asked to see the HVAC, and fiddled with the little cooling system for quite a while.. But after he left the AC really didn’t feel any better. I thought the whole thing was pretty strange and the usual HVAC man must have been off-duty, but it got weirder the next day when I saw housekeeping. It was the same man, but wearing a maids outfit.

Portable space heater