Technical Difficulties

I call it Guts of Iron

Because this is what it looks like when you're in a hurry to get out the door and you trip over the iron cord then the iron goes flying across the room only to land with a splashing THWACK on the floor and the retractable cord housing breaks off the bottom and the metal coil unleashes itself in a hissing, scraping fury seething "I'll never be caged again!"  And it really won't.  I have seen this before in a Weed Whacker incident.  Trust me.

So it isn't actually iron guts but retractable cord mechanism guts but creative license here people.  Work with me.  Guts of Iron.  I'm thinking of mounting the whole iron on the wall like a trophy.  Like a warning for other small appliances that are contemplating mutiny.  It may be too late for that though.

My AC went out today.  That wasn't exactly an appliance mutiny situation however.  I am almost positive that was accidental murder.  What would that be called?  Applianceslaughter?  And it's only temporary.  The Air Conditioning was temporarily murdered by some rogue ants who reside in the massive colony upon which my house seems to have been built.  It's a generational thing.  Every few years some upstart ants get hooked on the siren song from my HVAC unit.  Something about the electrical hum draws them in like addicts and they march one by one, as ants are known to do, to their deaths.  

One deviant ant begins this single file journey, winding his way through the cords and into the boxy thing (which may be called a capacitor, I'm not sure) seeking the source of the hypnotic, electrical whir.  And then he gets electrocuted to death.  And then the next one who has been following close behind out of a sense of relentless obligation climbs over his dead ant leader with the same result.  And it just goes on and on.  Ants are so fucking stupid. 

Anyway, once enough dead ants pile into the circuitry they clog it up and interrupt the current thereby not only killing themselves but also the source of their madness.  Maybe they're not that stupid.  Maybe the last one knew he was a martyr.  Maybe he screamed some Remember the Alamo rallying cry and all his ant brethren are holding a candlelight vigil in his honor in this moment to praise the ant gods that the threat of the Monolith of Doom has been destroyed.

You know what ants?  Sorry.  The AC is getting fixed this weekend.  hopefully.  Because all you need to do is just take out the probable capacitor thing and tap-tap off the disgustingly thick, gooey layers of fried ant martyr carcass and put the boxy whatever thing back in and Viola!  Forced Air!  It's a miracle!

I have seen this done many times.  At least four since I've lived here.  So of course I tried it myself this afternoon.  But I realized I never saw the guys remove the boxy thing/capacitor part and even though I switched off the electricity to that because it was making a weird noise anyway and I'm not that crazy about massive explosions in my general house and yard vicinity...given my penchant for unintentionally frying electrical equipment myself, I figured this was a job best left to a professional.  Because...see?

Amid all those wires is the boxy thing but I couldn't figure how to get it out without turning a little tap-tap problem into a "Dear god, Silver!  What the fuck were you thinking?!" problem and in my experience those are super expensive to remedy. 

Because here's the thing.  Even though I'm not feeling especially bonkers at the moment...my boobs are telling me there's PMS happening.  And seriously Me + PMS + Electricity = Very Bad Combination.  So I just backed away quietly and turned all the ceiling fans in the house on high. 

Thank god Cindy Brady's boyfriend Blackbeard is an HVAC specialist.  He fixed the problem last time and if I ask him very nicely he might come over tomorrow and help me out again.  fingers crossed because I tried to audition my cocktail attire for Blogapalooza this afternoon despite the liquid heat coursing through the house and form fitting dresses are really hard to assess when you're all sticky from humidity.  Not to mention remove.  There were almost scissors involved in one case. 

Southern fried or not?  This is almost oppressive.