FURNACE AND AIR CONDITIONER

 

 

A while back we decided that we needed a new furnace and central air conditioning. When I say “we” of course I mean that Louise decided we needed a furnace and central air and eventually I embraced the inevitable and agreed that she was right in this and most other things. The summers have been getting much hotter the last few years and the window shaker air conditioner just isn’t cutting it. Plus I am getting older and the installation is getting a little more difficult every year.

 

My reluctance was based mainly on being cheap/tight/thrifty/Scroogelike and pretty much tight fisted. It isn’t that we couldn’t afford it, but what if I live to be a hundred and need that money to pay for extra food in the home the kids put me in or protection so I don’t get dry humped by the staff. I doubt that will happen, I am no prize now and in another thirty years I will have to pay someone to dry hump me.

 

The other reason is that I would have to clear away shit from the shed at the side of the house and from around the furnace. No good has ever come from cleaning! Plus it is a lot of work and I am happily retired. It turned out not to be too much work but I will be able to complain about it for months and years to come.

 

The furnace has been working fine and has since it was installed in 1992. However, who is to say just how long it would have continued to work fine. A buddy of mine has a company come in every summer to do routine maintenance on his furnace for a couple of hundred bucks a pop. Being cheap I You Tubed how to do that maintenance and saved myself $200 bucks every year. Of course I understand that what I did had almost no impact on the furnace, but I felt better.

 

That brings us to today.

 

We have a couple of guys in here banging and screwing and drilling up a storm. They ripped the old furnace out and are in the process of putting the new one in. I guess tomorrow will see the AC installed. I love to watch people work just as much as people don’t like being watched when they work. I have been drifting down to check out the progress all morning but I am very obviously in the way.

 

So here I am writing a blog for the first time in a long time just to keep myself busy. I have been retired for about fifteen years and I kind of miss working. I would love to go down and hold a light for the guys or pass them the drill, but I am really not needed. When I say I miss working that is only true if I don’t have to work. I guess I like the idea of working but not the actual work itself.

 

Anyways, I will put up with the noise and the feeling of being useless for another day or so and once the furnace is hooked up and I am assured of being cool on the hottest days of the summer I will go back to bitching about how much work I have to do finding new homes for all of the crap I have moved in the past week or two. I have to keep it so the kids will have something to toss in the garbage bin when I die.

Day Four

So, it is the end of day four of our cross the middle of Canada trip and we are spending the night in Sault Ste Marie. The motel tonight looked a little dodgy when we drove up, but after a wonderful supper at Sando’s we are now relaxing in middle class comfort.

The drive was winding all over the place, and up and down hills. I talked to a long time resident of northern Ontario at breakfast and he described it perfectly. The country is very beautiful but not at all scenic. Basically we drove through a green and rock coloured tunnel with a blue roof. Not unpleasant, but God could have done better.

The roads are in much better condition than they were fifty years ago. I had hoped for a full twinning of the highway, but all good things come to those who wait. We weren’t sure if we would come back via the US, but as it stands now we will Canadian the hell out of our return trip.

The highlight was the Wawa goose of course. Who doesn’t love a dinosaur sized bird? The other highlight of the drive was the views of Lake Superior. There wasn’t enough of that beautiful lake. In the US they would have put the highway right along the lakeshore and capitalize the shit out of it. There would have been 4385 kilometres of mini putt, go karts, golf courses, McDonalds, palace sized cottages, etc. the entire distance. I am sort of glad it is the way it is.

You know that the US is eyeing all of that water and making plans about how to pipe it down to the dry states. They need to keep those Las Vegas fountains flowing and fruit and veggies growing in the desert.

Tomorrow is our last day of driving and we get to see Maegan and family. I am looking forward to that.