Complications and Abbreviations

So the a/c guys showed up right on time Wednesday morning, half an hour after I returned from my training ride. They got to work tearing out the old a/c and furnace and setting up the new ones, and by mid-afternoon they were telling me they were almost done. Awesome. I might be able to make the Wednesday Worlds training race on the Lakefront after all.

Well, not quite.

First there was some big argument and I could hear the guy in charge reaming out one of the younger guys for something. Then it got quiet for a while. Then I started to smell burning electronics. Bad sign. They had failed to check the voltage of the circuit and had hooked up the new 110v blower to the old 220v circuit. More cursing coming from the basement. I look out the window and one of the guys is pacing up and down out on the street, talking on his cellphone and waving his arms. It was already getting too late to make the training race. After a while another truck pulls up and they remove the blower from that one to replace the one they smoked. It was around 7 pm by the time they got the a/c working and called it a day, promising to come back this morning to hook up the furnace. Before they left I pointed out that they had the condensate line draining into a nonfunctional pipe, which wouldn't do at all.

Well, this morning's installation efforts didn't go so well either. After shorting something out and blowing a fuse, they couldn't get the furnace to come on at all. They were stumped and had to call for reinforcements that were supposed to come by later in the day. They didn't, of course. Good thing I won't need heat until November.

So in the midst of all of these complications I went out this morning to meet the long Thursday ride, knowing I'd have an abbreviated ride so that I could meet the installers on time. The ride started out fairly fast and then just got faster. There were attacks. There were counter-attacks. But I knew Tim and Woody would probably be turning back early. As it turned out they turned back earlier than I, so I had a nice solo 15 mile ride back home. It was too bad I had to turn around early today because I was feeling pretty good. By the time I got back I was soaked with sweat, which is pretty much how it will be for the next three months or so. After the a/c guys gave up and punted, around 1 pm, I figured I may as well take the car to the office in case the guy who knew how to make the heater work happened to call. Of course, he never did, and when I got back into the car to drive home the car's thermometer was registering 115 F. Of course, the air temperature was really more like 95. Anyway, hopefully we can get this whole a/c-heating thing resolved tomorrow. At least I have a neat new programmable thermostat to play with in the meantime!