Half-tracking time.

Some folks complain about having a one-track mind but I’m beginning to think mine is only a half-track model. Sadly, that’s what I am trying to focus the splatter and sputter of my fleeting attention span on this Tuesday morning, April 7, 2009. We thought we might have a problem with our central air conditioning unit at our home, therefore, I dispatched out a technician. I told my wife that I didn’t think it could be anything that serious since it had not been that long since we had the system replaced. Okay, Mr. Half Track, how long ago did you have it replaced? How about the summer of 1994? Wow! That’s nearly fifteen years ago but I remember it like it was last week. I was up in Chicago on a project when it went out. The house was built in the early seventies and I believe the unit that went out was the original. My wife and boys were sweltering and had to move into a small room upstairs that had a small a/c unit until we could get something done. I negotiated the deal from my office in Chicago and there you have it, that’s when it was done. Fifteen years. Hey, that’s not that long. I remember when we had this new one installed and how they told us that the old unit was so very inefficient but the new unit would be so much more efficient.

Yesterday the technician arrived and checked everything out. He couldn’t pinpoint any significant problem that would have caused what we thought was a power surge on the compressor but that didn’t stop him from giving me a laundry list of other issues. First, he said the attic furnace was 25 years old. That would be correct since it was brand new when we bought the house in 1984. He also correctly read the label on the a/c unit and gave its proper age of 14 plus years. He was as much a sales technician as he was a fix it technician. This was supposedly because of his twenty-three years of experience which qualified him to diagnose and fix as well as quote pricing on much more efficient replacement systems. Where have I heard this before? It must have been just recently when we had the previous much more efficient system installed. This dude had more options than you could shake a stick at but we definitely will seek out a second, third, and perhaps even a fourth opinion before we pull the trigger on this costly project.

But back to the half-track subject I was commiserating about early on in this diatribe. Unfortunately, more and more stuff seems to be landing in that just recent category but it turns out to be many years ago. Where did the time go? Where is the time going? How did it get away so quickly? Why am I fulminating over all of this? Why do I care? Should I care? Who cares that I care? What was it I was even talking about? It had to be something important because whatever it was it just happened recently, I think, but on second thought I will have to get back to you on it. Okay, that’s enough for a Tuesday. I think I’ve done enough damage for one day. See you next time and may God bless you and yours. Amen. ….More later.