One of the newest countries my husband has added to his travel portfolio is Yerevan, Armenia. Neither of us knew what to expect so we were excited for his upcoming trip. My husband really enjoyed experiencing all Yerevan had to offer from the friendly culture to the awesome food….barbecue. Armenia is known for its BBQ around the world; they literally grill everything! The grill naturally brought everyone together and prompted lots of talk about site seeing, world issues, and work-of course! This was perfect for my husband as he is definitely a people person. Additionally, Yerevan was celebrating its 2800th year as the capital of Armenia. To commemorate this tremendous occasion, an inauguration of the Yerevan 2800 Anniversary Park occurred in May. The park includes 250 new trees, 5 bronze statues, and Urartu style bull and lion statues and is currently maintained by the same family for the past 99 years.
Armenia is known for its art, innovation and sculptures and my husband found the perfect example; a giant spider made from discarded metal outside the Moscow Cinema. This sculpture is so big that husband can stand almost upright underneath it. As for me (who has a fears of spiders) I was not nearly as enthused. After visiting the spider (of my nightmares), he had the opportunity to visit Republic Square and see the Singing and Dancing fountains. A water feature with a light show set to classical, pop or jazz music; it is definitely a must see and favorite tourist attraction.
Meanwhile back at home, we were burning up!! Throughout the week, I began to notice that the house was getting hotter. I assumed it was nothing as the temperature outside had been steadily increasing from 100 to 108 with heat indexes between 110 and 115. These are normal temperatures where we leave and are typical for August. But there was something about this heat that just didn’t feel right. Little did I know, the attic unit of our A/C was struggling to keep up and finally….it gave up. The A/C repair man showed up with lightening speed to see if he could fix it but it couldn’t be fixed….we needed an entirely new attic unit. In the words of my son, “Fun Fact….Did you know that when a motor blower goes out, the cool air from the coil doesn’t go anywhere? And if the cool air doesn’t go anywhere, the coil will freeze and become a large block of ice? And if the coil is left like that too long it will slowly start to thaw and cause a massive leak in your attic? Ours didn’t do that but that’s the story the A/C man painted for me in my mind. After paying $$$$ and waiting a week for parts and then the install of the brand new coil, blower wheel and blower motor we were finally cooling down….or so we thought. The A/C went out again!! The A/C repair man came back and stated the A/C drain was clogged which caused the drain pan to fill up which flipped the safety switch which causes the A/C to turn off. Thank goodness for safety switches, right? After this second round of A/C failures, I was for sure we were back in business. Wrong again….the A/C went out again!
At this point, I was so frustrated I was ready to sell the whole house! It’s too HOT to deal with these issues. The A/C repair man came back out…..at this point he had memorized my address and phone number since he had been out so many times. Go figure. He even brought the district manger with him to help! After an hour of going in and out of the attic and in and out of the house to the outside unit they determined it was the zone control board. Fun fact…..the zone control board is basically the “brain” of the A/C and it stopped working. It didn’t know if it needed to be cooling and when it should cool. After all those repairs, no wondered it was confused-if it was me, I would be. Sheesh! Needless to say, I have learned more about A/C units than I care to. Does this qualify me as an HVAC specialist?
Here are your tips for surviving chaos when your A/C goes out:
- Popsicles: they’ll keep the kids cool in the hot house (and somewhat sane)
- Food delivery: this way you don’t have to turn on the stove or oven (its already hot in the house)
- Emergency fund: you never know when you are going to need it
- A tribe: friends and family who will let you hang out at their house….all. day. long.
- Kindness: remember…..the repairman has been in hot attics all day…..including yours
- Wine: this should be self explanatory
Until the next adventure, safe travels….
The Traveller's Wife 