No,no,I gotta a Baby!!!!!

Jackmartin

Sometimes I think there is an invisible sign over my head that says " Need an idiot "with an arrow pointing down. I live in Winnipeg and the cities slang name is Winnterpeg because of the temperatures we hit. What a lot of people do not know, we get extremely hot summers and this year is one of them. Friday last, was one of those days, the temperature with the humidity added was 104 and it felt like it. I was on a roof changing out a five ton compressor on this out of the ark Lennox heat/cool package unit. I told the customer putting a new compressor in this thing was like doing a heart transplant on a week old corpse: but, they wanted a new compressor,period. So , I am on the roof and the thermometer says it is 108 degrees so sweat Jerk. I change out the little beast and throw the switch, so I can get out of there, and all I get is Hummmmmm. I knew immediately what was wrong, bad capacitor, now I am anal about checking the capacitor on every thing I work on, I guess old age struck this time. I drive over to the wholesale, using language that would make a sailor blush, the wholesale is so busy I wave the capacitor at one of the counter guys and he says good --- go! Now,I am back on the roof and it is going on three o'clock and I have to drive down main street to get home. We have two big arteries in Winnipeg for traffic, Portage Ave and Main Street, and hit them at 4:00 or later on a Friday and they are two large parking lots.Well, yours truly, was on Main Street at 4:35 and we are going to get to know each other well, because we are going a block an hour. I finally get home at 6:30, looking like a very dirty drowned gopher and my wife just tells me to hurry up and have a shower, dinner is almost ready. Nine o'clock rolls around and I am doing what any red blooded male is doing ; snoring in front of the idiot box. I suppose my wife told me to go to bed, I just don't recall it? Dead to the world, I realize someone is gently shaking my shoulder and calling my name, I of course responded in an intelligent fashion, wha,wha or something to that effect. My wife is telling me there is a person on the phone and it is an emergency, which seemed strange, given it was still 80 outside and to the best of my knowledge, you don't use your heating equipment at that temperature. It seems, this person is new to the neighborhood and one of my brother in laws gave him our unlisted home phone number. I have way to many brother in laws! The person on the phone is talking a mile a minute and English is not his first language. I finally get the gist of his problem, his a/c is not working and it is hot in his house. I tell him to use a fan and I will come over tomorrow at 7:00 am and repair it, no,no,no he says; he has a baby. Our boys are both men but,you never stop being a parent and I remember how worried we used to get, so I said I would come over, even if it was 1:00 am. This type of thing happens alot in our house, my wife is a medical professional specializing in Palliative care ,so if we do not get at least one call a week in the wee hours it is a strange week. I arrive at the house and I had no problem finding it, the backyard was so lite up, you could have read War and Peace with no problem. The suction line is frozen so that's easy to figure out, low on gas. I leak test, find the leak on the discharger shrader and repair it if you call tightening something a repair. Leak check everything else and yes I checked the capacitor.The machine is running fine and I just had to ask this man how someone maybe 10 years younger than me has a new baby. I suppose he takes this as a request to see the baby and he tells me he will go and get her. Now, I remember from the days the boys were small,you never ever wake a sleeping baby, before I could say NO, he is gone. So I am checking the gauges and he announces here is my baby! I turn around and there is a young lady about five feet two absolutely drop dead gorgeous, she looked like she should have been on Sports Illustrated representing some Mediterranean country. I am thinking to myself, how am I going to do open heart surgery on this guy with my Sporlan valve wrench,when out of the blue, this lovely young women gives me a big hug and kisses me on the cheek and tells me I am so kind to fix their cooling. Needless to say, this hot sweaty old serviceman is now standing there no longer intent on heart surgery, just red as beet and completely flustered. She says good night and I tell her old man I have to go to the truck and write up an invoice. This guy goes from being calm to frightened in about a half second. No invoice, no invoice, the government will find out I have money. This is not uncommon, I have old immigrant customers who are the same way, terrified of the government. We reach a price and he insists on cash and here is an extra fifty dollars ,so you can buy a nice bottle of wine. Finally, I am home, it's 3:00 in the morning and of course my wife is still up, that womens sleeps about four hours a night. She asks how it went and I told her, which of course makes her break into giggles because she knows how shy I am around women and I tell her about the no invoice thing. I give her the money, like I always do and I ask her to count it, she gives me a look like are you okay? She counts it anyway and says there is too much money here,fifty dollars to be exact? Yeah says I, he told me to buy a good bottle of wine and of course my wife breaks into laughter, you see I was born with a genetic abnormality, any and all alcohol, tastes to me the way turpentine smells. I have had exactly three glasses of alcohol in my entire life. Our laughter was short lived, the phone rang and Mr. B was having trouble with his pain medication so out the door my wife went, get yourself a bottle of wine, YUCK. All the best Jack

unclejohn

That's the saddest story I ever heard. You can't drink alcohol. I wonder if you could get a taste bud transplant.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Nice story @Jackmartin . Your a hard worker. I am a sucker for a sob story from a customer or a relative although I hate to admit it.

One of the reasons I want to retire is to get away from the emergency's

HVACNUT

You got suckered and you're still in good spirits. You're a better man than me. Once I saw "Baby", I would've charged triple.

FranklinD

You sir are a good man! And it’s good to hear that I’m not the only person with that particular “genetic abnormality” - wine/beer/champagne/liquor all smells like kerosene to me and tastes like bug spray. I don’t fit in real well in my neck of the woods because of that - we have a population of 26,000 and 127 liquor licenses in the city proper! Not counting the new trend in craft breweries. Oh well....never been late for work!

ScottSecor

Sounds somewhat familiar, I think you just got another customer for life. I was asuming you were going to tell us "Baby" was their pet. Always enjoy the job stories, I think they may be more interesting up in Canada?

ratio

I too was waiting for Baby to come trotting out on four legs, but I think this alternate ending is much more enjoyable.

Too bad about your alcohol issue, but don't worry about it too much, I've got you covered.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Back in the day my friends and I had a softball team. Played about 20 years until my knees started barking. Softball was fun but the beer after the game was much better. Guess I got it out of my system back then.

But now, for some reason I hardly drink at all. I will go a couple of months with no alcohol. If we go out to dinner or on vacation or 4th of July I'll have a couple of beers or a Jack N Coke.

hot_rod

Great story, thanks for posting.
I'll give you a hollar next time I get up that way.
Interesting city to fly into, and a lot of windshield time involved in covering the territory.

Paul Pollets

Great story...