Category: Air Conditioning

“Land ahoy!” The captain bounded to the front of the ship, peering over the edge with a steady hand on his tiny forehead. He motioned for his first mate to steer accordingly at the island in the distance.

“Aye, aye, captain!” His first mate, who also happened to be his dad, twisted the couch pillow ship’s wheel tightly. 

The captain stumbled slightly as he traversed the side of the ship, balancing precariously on the arms of the couch that formed the makeshift bird’s nest. 

“We are approaching land, guard up,” the captain barked back at his first mate. His first mate was preoccupied for a second with smiling at his wife in the doorway. Sweat dripped down his face in the summer heat, the aircon in the corner of the room whirring and producing a pathetically weak airflow. The captain saw the danger instantly.

“Trouble bayside! Cooling our dragon cannons now, I saw a sea monster!” 

The first mate turned serious, grabbing a nearby nerf cannon. He pretended to be encumbered under the weight of the ‘cannon’ ball as he reloaded it. 

“Not like that,” the captain said, taking the item off him and clumsily fitting a foam ball into it. “Like this.” Then, he handed it back to a gracious first mate.

There was giggling from the doorway, which the first mate once again became preoccupied by. 

“So honey, I’m guessing you haven’t found technicians for air conditioning near South Yarra yet?” His wife said from the doorway. Booking repairs for the air conditioning system had been his chore. Given the heat wave they were facing, and the lack of cold air in the house, his procrastination was evident. 

The first mate struggled to get up from the couch pillows he was trapped under. “There’s no aircon at sea,” he said sheepishly.

The captain bounded onto the side of the couch, pointing a foam sword in the direction of the doorway. “Do you see that?” He whispered to his dad, behind a small hand. “I think there’s a sea creature over there.”

A smile wound its way onto his dad’s face. With a determined look between them, they both began to load up their nerf toys. The ‘sea creature’ in question shook her head. She looked to consider her options for a moment.

Then, with a sudden start, she raised her arms high above her head. She stuck out her tongue and quickly ran after the captain, who giggled with glee. “I’m going to eat you first!” she cried out, amidst the sea of laughter.

The air conditioner could wait for now.

 

 

 

 

 

My husband really frustrates me at times. Ladies, I’ll let you in on a huge secret; if you ever get an inkling that your boyfriend or husband-to-be has some lazy tendencies, run. Run like the wind! I saw quite a few signs that my boyfriend was going to be a lazy husband one day, but I ignored the signs as I assumed he would improve once life became more serious. Boy was I wrong there!

We’ve been needing to book an air conditioning repair specialist in Cheltenham for the last week. I don’t think he’s even made a single attempt to get in touch with one. Our house feels like the inside of an oven. Do you know what he does to cool down? He sits with his feet soaking in an ice bucket. Whenever I ask him if he’s made the call, he simply shrugs and tells me he doesn’t feel hot. Ordinarily, I’d happily make the booking myself but I’m holding out now out of principle. I work in a very meeting-heavy job during the day, so it’s quite difficult for me to find the time to call someone and make a booking. My husband, however, doesn’t work. He’s at home all day. I’m sure he can find five minutes in his day to call an air conditioning contractor. Ormond has heaps of them. He doesn’t even need to find the contractor. I’ve given him a list of multiple air conditioning contractors in the area. Instead, he’s too busy just worrying about if he’s feeling hot or cold.

I’d hate to think if we had children. He’d be so lazy. Our children would most likely be left to sit in their rooms and boil, while their dad enjoys his footbath. My friend gave me some great advice the other day; she told me that it’s not too late to become single again. She’s not wrong. A lot of marriages fail, and it’s not like I’m trying to keep it together for kids. I don’t think this guy is even suitable to be a father of kids. 

 

‘Can you believe this cold?’ I asked Jeanine, my desk mate. She looked up from her keyboard and frowned at me, pointing to her headphones. I blinked at her patiently.

Eventually, she slipped the headphones over her ear and rolled her eyes at me.

‘What?’

‘Can you believe this cold?’ I repeated.

‘Seriously, Chris?’ she asked with a sigh. ‘I’m trying to get some work done.’

‘I know,’ I said, interrupting her as she went to block me out again. ‘It’s just… has management been told about this?’

‘About what?’ she said, frown deepening.

‘The climate control in this office!’

‘I’m sure they don’t care.’

‘Shouldn’t they?’ I raised my eyebrows. ‘Shouldn’t they be rushing out here saying “sorry folks, we’ve gotten in contact with the best air conditioning servicer local to Canberra, they’ll be here any second!”?’

Jeanine blinked slowly at me. ‘Right. Look, if this is another one of your “down with the management class” speeches you’re building up to, I have so much work to do—’

‘People of the Canberra office!’ I cried out, rising out of my chair and clambering on top of my desk. I stood proudly, hands pressed against my hips as approximately a third of my colleagues looked up at me. ‘Aren’t you tired of this?’

‘Yeah,’ came one voice from the back of the room. ‘But you still won’t stop for some reason!’

A smattering of giggles spread through the office. I ignored them.

‘We deserve better, comrades!’ I continued, raising a fist in solidarity. ‘We deserve to be comfortable as we make these people their money. We deserve a local heater servicing company! Near Canberra! Not far away, in some distant suburb, taking food out of the mouths of our local businesses and forcing them to suckle ever harder at capitalism’s drying teat!’

‘Okay,’ Jeanine sighed underneath me. ‘That’s a bit much.’

‘Join me, brothers!’ I hollered. ‘Join me in a strike! Join me in a—’

I gasped as Jeanine hit me in the back of the knees with a keyboard, and I fell off the desk.

‘Seriously,’ she said. ‘I really have to get this work done.’