Hallelujah!

Guess whose air conditioning is fixed? Yup, ours. What a wonderful feeling, and wait till you hear the best part...

When we bought the house we currently live in, (we moved in a year ago tomorrow) we had a great realtor. He told us that if we ever need a handyman, a lawn guy, a furnace guy, etc. to call him because he has a lot of contacts. So I called our realtor first thing this morning to get the name and number of his A/C guy. Unfortunately, I had to leave a message, and then prayed that he would call back in a timely fashion. When it had been about an hour and a half and we hadn't heard from him, we decided that we needed to come up with another plan. Now, usually I would be more patient than that, but it's Friday and it was 95 degrees in our house. This was no time for patience. This was time for major crabbiness. The weekend is supposed to be even hotter.

Before we moved to Minneapolis, I worked for a plumbing and heating wholesale company. So I got on the phone and called my old boss and asked him if he knew of anyone I could call in our area, since he is originally from here. He didn't know anyone personally, but told me that he'd give me to the heating customer service guy there in the office, and maybe he could do some troubleshooting for me. Dennis (the heating dude) is a great guy. I sat about 5 feet away from him every day for 2 years. He's a lot of fun, and always enjoyed giving me no end of crap when we worked together. So he asked me questions and had me try a few things, and nothing was making a difference. It all boiled down to 2 possibilities: it was either the capacitor or the compressor. He said if it was the capacitor, it would probably be a relatively cheap fix and we might even be able to do it ourselves. If it was the compressor, he said we might as well buy a whole new unit, by the time we pay for parts and labor. I was obviously hoping for the cheap fix here, since Jason and I had already decided that if it was the compressor or we needed a whole new unit, that we would have to suffer without A/C for the rest of the summer. We just can't afford it.

Dennis told me on the phone all about the capacitor--what it looked like, how to disconnect it, not to touch the contacts unless we wanted to get knocked on our asses. As he's telling me all of this, I'm thinking, "This is a waste of his breath. There's no way that Jason is going to agree to dig inside the A/C unit and try to disassemble something." But instead, he was gung-ho to do it, because, really, what other choice did we have a that point?

Jason found the capacitor and disconnected it. I was pretty excited by that alone! Then, at Dennis' suggestion, we brought it to Home Depot to see if they had the part we needed. The very nice employee told us that they don't carry that kind of part, but told us about a place in the next town that does. We went home and looked the place up on the internet so that we could at least find out if they carried it and if it was in stock. I gave him the numbers off of the old capacitor, and yes indeed, they carry it and it was in stock. At this point, I realize that it's all going too well. We're going to get the part home, hook it up, only to find out that that was not the problem after all. I tried really hard not to get my hopes up when the guy told me that the part sells for $24.95. That would be too good to be true!

Jason and Alex hopped in the van right away and headed to the store. They couldn't take Jason's car because, um, the A/C doesn't work. Anyway, when they returned home, Jason told me that when the guy saw our used capacitor, he said, "Wow! That thing is blown!" Again, I tried not to pin all my hopes on this little part that is the size of a small V-8 can.

Jason went outside and hooked it up, and then yelled to me to turn the power back on and then turn the A/C on. This is when the angels began to sing. It worked!!! Our air conditioning was fixed! By us!! For $25!!! I wanted to dance a happy jig. I shall never take air conditioning for granted again. Until about two days from now when I forget all about this.