Category: Air Conditioning

I’ve been in this game long enough to know every case has its tipping point. For this ‘cool’ case, it happened in a gallery in Beaumaris. The perfect setting for our final face-off.

The gallery was like a fortress, but with one Achilles heel – the air conditioning service business close to Beaumaris had recently installed a state-of-the-art cooling system. A siren call for our thief. Little did they know, it was also our battleground.

Walking through the dimly lit halls, the paintings seemed to come alive in the quiet. I could almost hear the whisper of the stolen ones amongst them, a silent plea for rescue. This was it. This was where it would end.

I had come prepared. I knew every nook and cranny of the cooling system, every duct, and every vent. Years of dealing with air conditioning installation businesses near Cheltenham had given me an almost instinctual knowledge of these systems.

As I expected, the thief was already there, hidden amongst the shadows. There was a moment of stillness, the calm before the storm, as we recognised each other. Then the game began.

We darted around the gallery, a deadly dance amongst priceless masterpieces. The thief was agile, but I was smarter. I cornered him in the main hall. The end was near.

Using the air conditioning control panel, I turned up the cold to full blast. The sudden drop in temperature took the thief by surprise. He lost his footing on the slick marble floor, and I made my move.

With a triumphant grin, I cuffed the shivering thief, ending the coldest chase Melbourne had ever seen. The stolen masterpieces were finally safe. There’s nothing like the thrill of a solved case, especially one as cool as this.

Finally, the lost were found, the culprit behind bars. As I handed over the stolen artwork to its rightful owners, I couldn’t help but feel a tinge of satisfaction. This case was closed, but I was sure Melbourne would soon have another mystery for me to solve.

 

The cooling is pretty important where I work. If you think about it for like, three seconds, you’ll figure out exactly what I mean. Elderly people need a certain level of comfort, because their temperatures just don’t really work the way they used to. So yeah, we just need some really good cooling to keep them comfortable and…the opposite thing. Gets a bit hot for me sometimes, but whatever. It’s just part of the job.

Yesterday, some guy from a company that offers Hawthorn based air con servicing came down to talk to us about our system. I explained the super-extreme importance of keeping all of our residents happy. I guess this is a regular summer thing, from what I’ve heard. We get the same spiel from the same people about what we’ve already been doing. But people DO come here to be comfortable, so it makes sense.

Now we have an extra duty of going through every room in the building and making sure they’re properly chilly. We’ll have to do the same thing in winter, too. If I’m even here then. Seems like a long way off, is what I’m saying.

Otherwise, it’s pretty cool having that rule (rhyme and pun not intended), because it means we’ll always be cool. Seriously, some of these mornings have been flippin’ freezing, and getting to work to find the whole place perfect? It’s the best. I guess it’s because people live here, and we have to keep everything toasty all the time.

I have to say a special thanks to the very best air con servicing Hampton has ever seen.

We have nothing to worry about. If no one else pays attention to all the heat stuff, I know I will.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

‘Honey?’ I called out absently into the house. ‘Sam, are you around?’

         ‘Yeah?’ she called back, voice coming from the bedroom.

         ‘Can you come here a minute?’

         ‘Why can’t you come here?’

         ‘Because I’m watching the telly,’ I said, briefly flicking up the volume for emphasis.

         ‘So?’

         ‘So I don’t want to miss anything!’

         ‘Well, I’m reading in bed,’ she said. ‘So if you want something, it better be important enough to get me out from under these covers.’

         ‘It is,’ I said. ‘It is, I promise.’

         I heard the muffled thumping of the blankets being shifted, and the unmistakable bass note of my wife grumbling to herself. After a second, she appeared behind me in the living room.

         ‘What?’ she asked, frowning.

         ‘Would you be able to flick the heating on?’ I asked her. ‘It’s getting quite chilly in here.’

         She blinked at me slowly for what felt like a full minute. ‘Excuse me?’

         ‘The heating,’ I said, gesturing at the thermostat set into the wall. ‘God, do you remember how cold this house used to get before we found someone to repair a heater near Canberra? Genuine lifesaver.’

         ‘You got me to get up out of my comfortable bed so I could turn on the thermostat that you can almost reach from the couch?!’

         I frowned at her, confused.

         ‘I told you, I’m watching something I don’t want to miss.’

         ‘It’s the commercials!’

         ‘Which is why we’re having this conversation now,’ I rolled my eyes. ‘Would you just…’

         I gestured at the heating control unit. She smiled thinly and turned to adjust it.

         ‘Enjoy,’ she said, icily.

         ‘Thanks!’

         ‘Oh, but just so you remember,’ she said from the doorway, ‘that person who came and fixed our heater? They also specialised in air conditioning repairs around Canberra too…’

         Laughing, she left the room, and I frowned at what she meant.

         After a moment, I began rubbing my arms, as an icy chill drifted into the room from the vents.

         ‘No…’ I whispered. ‘She wouldn’t.’

         ‘She did!’ came the call from the well-blanketed bedroom.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I shivered as I walked into the office, drawing my coat around me and quickly hurrying to my desk.

         ‘Morning,’ rang the chorus, as I passed by several of my colleagues, and I half-heartedly acknowledged most of them. Well, half of them. One or two, I think.

         I slammed down in my chair, still absolutely freezing, and kept my coat wrapped around myself. It was always so damned cold in this building, even on a lovely spring morning like this! Why couldn’t they ever just leave the thermostat alone? No, every man in the building was suddenly an air conditioning technician from Canberra, intricately dialling in on the settings and tweaking the optimal airflow, with the specific goal of annoying me.

         Grumbling to myself, I flicked the mouse across my desk pad to wake the computer up. Work, the work, focus on the work, I told myself. Ignore your surroundings. Find your inner calm. Find your inner… find your… find… WAS IT GETTING COLDER?!

         I spun around in my chair, looking for the source, and felt a slight cold breeze tickle the back of my neck. I whipped my head around to the source ­­– a fully-blasted-open vent, right above my desk.

         I pushed the rage down inside me. I pushed it down deep.

         ‘Morning, Gretchen,’ Molly waved, walking past me with a company bagel. I ignored her; it was for her own safety.

         ‘Getting a little chilly, isn’t it?’ Molly said, seemingly reluctant to carry on with her life, unharmed. ‘I wish I knew how to get gas heating installed around Canberra, then I’d be set for the winter.’

         ‘It isn’t winter though, is it,’ I whispered.

         ‘What’s that now?’

         ‘This morning,’ I went on. ‘This season. It isn’t winter, is it?’

         ‘Oh,’ Molly frowned. ‘I suppose I haven’t really been keeping track—’

         ‘It’s spring!’ I roared, jumping to my feet, chair tipping over backwards. ‘It only feels like winter because somebody, somewhere, has decided that we need to be freezing in this office to get our work done!’

         Molly stared at me blankly for a second… then slowly walked away.