Saturday, February 21, 2009
Furnace to the Fire
We have a lovely little man who comes to look at our hearing and air conditioning system every six months. He brings knee pads and a vacuum and crawls around poking at things and fretting about fan belts and batteries and the like. His moral disapprobation of a dirty humidifier is to be feared and his praise for a regularly-changed furnace filter is to be most fervently sought after. He even brings a little laptop and portable printer to create the invoice when all is said and done. He is, in short, a god among men.
Unfortunately, I find myself wholly unable to live up to his standard. Each time he visits, he wants to explain my furnace to me in great detail. He wants me to see the impact of an improperly-set humidifier control. He wants to prove to me the near-deadness of the battery that starts the fan motor. He wants me to know that I don't have to put the filter cover on if I don't want to. And I have no idea how to respond to any of this. Frankly, I'd much rather hide in my room and watch Reba reruns on Lifetime. But his seriousness of purpose intimidates me into nodding my head a lot and saying "wow" and "right, that makes sense." I feel like the world's worst furnace owner.
We spent an hour and a half together this week. But it seemed like a lifetime. A beautiful dream of how heating and cooling should be.
We have a lovely little man who comes to look at our hearing and air conditioning system every six months. He brings knee pads and a vacuum and crawls around poking at things and fretting about fan belts and batteries and the like. His moral disapprobation of a dirty humidifier is to be feared and his praise for a regularly-changed furnace filter is to be most fervently sought after. He even brings a little laptop and portable printer to create the invoice when all is said and done. He is, in short, a god among men.
Unfortunately, I find myself wholly unable to live up to his standard. Each time he visits, he wants to explain my furnace to me in great detail. He wants me to see the impact of an improperly-set humidifier control. He wants to prove to me the near-deadness of the battery that starts the fan motor. He wants me to know that I don't have to put the filter cover on if I don't want to. And I have no idea how to respond to any of this. Frankly, I'd much rather hide in my room and watch Reba reruns on Lifetime. But his seriousness of purpose intimidates me into nodding my head a lot and saying "wow" and "right, that makes sense." I feel like the world's worst furnace owner.
We spent an hour and a half together this week. But it seemed like a lifetime. A beautiful dream of how heating and cooling should be.
