The Unexpected Hotel Guests

Does that sound like a Hitchcock short, or what!?!

Saturday afternoon, just after Brett and I finished our slow morning of Scrabble, Yahtzee & a Freschetta pizza, I left for work & Brett noticed the house was getting stuffy. He checked the thermostat and saw that the temperature was set for 74, but was reading 81. Ruh-roh.

Fast forward to 4:00. After changing the filter, resetting the system and leaving it off for a while, the house was 87 degrees. Time to file our first ever (in this lovely rental house) maintenance request.

You report maintenance issues online (the owner of this house uses a service to find and manage his renters) and Brett found how to do that fairly easily. That is when the first of at least a dozen good things happened.

The agency called Brett immediately to confirm the problem and inform him that they would be contacting the owner. There was almost no waiting on that. The owner then called Brett to access the situation. Unfortunately, some confusion followed. The owner is an older gentleman - late 70s, early 80s. At the best of times, he can be a bit hard to follow, and Saturday was NOT the best of times! He was calling us from a hospital bed! He is fighting an infection and was hospitalized for it the day before. But he called to tell us he was sending out his son (or son-in-law... I'm still not clear on the relation) to come and check out the unit the following day.

At this point it is 6:30, still 87 degrees in the house, and incredibly uncomfortable! So Brett and I decided to get out of the house and stay out as long as we could. Let the sun go down and hope that the house cools off a bit. We started by heading to a nice, cool restaurant for dinner.

Well, before we could even place our order at said restaurant, the phone rang again! It was the owner telling us that his son was on his way to the house. So we ate fast, rushed home and began our evening of sweat. I'm sorry, there's just not a nice way to say it. It was a long, hot, sweat-fest.

But that is really the only negative thing that I can say about the experience. Well, that and neither one of us slept much - Brett couldn't cope with the gentle roar of our borrowed box fan. And every time I started to doze off, I woke up startle thinking that something was smothering me. It only got down to 84 degrees, so even though I was breathing in oxygen, my lungs were not getting the relief that fresh air usually brings.

But we made it through the night. And here are all of the good things that happened:

- Mike, the owner's son (in-law?) was a really nice guy. He couldn't fix the unit, so he called his AC guy and they were able to figure out what needed replacing over the phone. It would be Monday morning before they could buy the part, but they knew the problem and could fix it without us being home since it was the outdoor unit.

- When we went to my parents house to borrow their 2 portable fans, my mom slipped me $50 and said "Stay at a cheap hotel! It's miserable without air conditioning!" A fact that is fresh on her mind because their AC went out just last week! Saturday night, we needed to stay home to take care of some things, but the first thing I said to Brett Sunday morning was "let's see how much a night at La Quinta would be". It was SO nice to have that option.

- Church on Sunday was great and afterwards we had lunch with my family to celebrate Father's Day! It was so much fun! I laughed so hard at Jenna's stories and we all smiled so big passing my sweet nephew around the table. It was a great day.

- We went straight to the hotel after lunch. What a nice treat! Sooo relaxing, away from the chores and tasks that so easily occupy us while we are at home. I cut coupons, wrote out this blog (Brett's tablet doesn't like this website), Brett napped and I started reading The Hunger Games again. hehe. Loving it STILL!

It was a memorable weekend for so many reasons. Sweatiest night of my adult life. Most fun Father's Day I can think of. (Everything is fun when you have a baby around.) And a super comfortable night at a local hotel. I couldn't stop smiling yesterday. Once we got out of the house that is.

This blog was brought to you by the letters A and C and the number 74. Degrees, that is! Back in the land of the air conditioned!