End of Silence

The following family moment is brought to you by Ornery Toddlers R Us.

My sister was in town last week to help out while The Wife was in D.C. helping with my father-in-law’s recovery from heart surgery (he’s doing well, thanks) and to hunt for a place to live when she moves here later this year. A few days into her stay, she was standing in our home office with The Girl hanging onto her legs and making strange noises. Aunt E. looked down and said something to the effect of “Girl, you’ve got issues,” to which The Girl stood up and responded in a hostile voice, “I don’t need shoes!”

The Wife took The Boy to I-HOP yesterday as a break from a series of trips to Lowe’s and Home Depot to get supplies to finish off the flooring that’s been in the works since The Incident. Apparently, he inhaled a cheese omelet, sausage, bacon and a couple of pancakes, no doubt he’s about to have another growth spurt. The trip prompted two classic quotes from The Boy.

First, as The Wife tells it, the waitstaff at I-HOP were particularly perky yesterday morning. Their waitress greeted them, went through the usual offers of drinks and finished with the time-tested, “My name is <INSERT NAME HERE>. Just let me know if you need anything else.” After she left the table, The Boy piped up in a very matter of fact voice without a trace of sarcasm or irony, “That was nice of her to tell us her name.” What a sweet kid.

The second classic occurred in the car on the way home from I-HOP. The Wife reports hearing The Boy making sniffing sounds from the back seat and then declaring that his hands smelled like bacon. The Wife, thinking this was bothering him, told him that he could wash his hands when they got home. The Boy responded, “No, I LIKE it. I know! They should make bacon soap!”

Ok, really. I’ve had enough. You can let up now. What’s the safe word?

We spent part of Saturday and most of yesterday trying to finish up the painting that we want to get done before the new floors are installed on Wednesday. We bought the actual flooring (22 cases) on Friday so that it could “acclimatize” to the house. Everything was going pretty well. We’d finished with the primer coat in the den and The Wife headed off to Home Depot for some more supplies while I entertained the kids.

We were outside when she returned. She noted that it seemed a bit warm in the house, but the A/C was still blowing air, so I thought we’d give it some time and see. Thirty minutes later, things weren’t improving, so I headed outside to find that the compressor wasn’t running. I figured out how to open it up so I could feign the ability to actually diagnose the problem. For those keeping score, opening the cover, staring at it, clearing out the cobwebs, spraying the hornet’s nest in the corner and blasting the filthy coils with water didn’t revive it. Cursing and staring at the sky didn’t work either. I resigned myself to calling a repair person at 5:30pm on a Sunday. Who knew what wonderful overtime charges awaited me? It took three different service calls before I found someone who wasn’t completely booked until at least Monday morning. I suppose I’m not the only Austinite who waits until the unit breaks down in a week or two of hundred degree temperatures before considering maintenance or replacement.

We finally scored with Petrocelli Services Inc. . I was informed that “Joe” could be at our place in 45 minutes. Sure enough, he arrived as promised and applied a meter to the compressor after determining that the circuit breaker had been tripped. In my defense, I thought of checking the breaker just as I went out to meet him. He showed me that the compressor was drawing much more power on startup than it should, a sign that it was old and heading for death. My options were to get a new compressor at the cost of at least $2k or try installing a compressor saver, apparently something that takes the load off the compressor at startup. It’d cost me $340 installed with labor. He thought it’d probably get me through the rest of this summer, but couldn’t guarantee anything. With all of the money spent on the house so far this year, I decided to take my chances with the $340 option. He had it installed in about 20 minutes. I could tell that the startup was quicker and less noisy with the new thingamajig installed. He also had me clear some branches away from the top of the unit to keep the hot exhaust from deflecting back at the unit.

I’ve been a little concerned about that A/C anyway, so I’m not surprised that it gave us some trouble. Our electric bills have been inching up for the past few summers and I think the old compressor is partly to blame. I actually had The Wife get some new filters while she was at Home Depot yesterday, so we’re starting out the week with a new filter, clean coils in the compressor and this new compressor saver. I guess I’m going to have to start planning for new A/C in the Spring and looking into those City of Austin financing options. We’ve only got the one unit with a thermostat downstairs to heat both floors of the house. The upstairs is constantly about 5 degrees hotter than the downstairs. We’ve got plenty of room in the attic, so I think if we replace the whole thing, we’ll move some of it up there and explore having temperature control on both floors. Of course, I’m saying this without having any idea what all of that will cost me.