Once Again, Technology Stymies Val Thevictorian

You’d think appliances would operate as programmed. It’s not like they’re Millennials, flinging generic hot dog buns all over Walmart with abandon, reveling in their special-snowflakeness. It’s not like they have a brain, even though it seems recent media would have you worry about computers taking over the world, just like they’re trying to make zombies happen. No. You would expect electronic doodads to operate within standard parameters, as long as they were getting their fix of electricity. Wouldn’t you?

That’s just what I was expecting Monday morning when I walked by the thermostat and switched it from holding the heat at 70 to holding the air conditioning at 77. You know. Because while nobody is home, there’s no need to waste money natural resources. Sure, this thermostat could probably be programmed, even though it’s the lesser babka, the cinnamon, compared to our last thermostat, the chocolate. You might recall when we were having trouble with our air conditioner a year or so ago, and the dude who came to work on it took our old thermostat and put in the new one where we have to move a lever to change from cool to off to heat. Seriously. Is this the stone age? Our old one could do that by itself. Set the temperature, and it knew if it should heat or cool. Anyhoo…

I set the thermostat to cool at 77. AND THE HEATER KEPT RUNNING! That is not okay. When I change the holding temperature, the heat or air kicks off (or on) within a minute. Here I was getting ready to go out the door to work, where I had duty at the crack of 7:45, and this ancient artifact was being cantankerous. To make matters worse, I heard a roaring noise in the kitchen. I don’t know why. The kitchen isn’t even over the furnace/AC unit. AND I smelled that charred burning dust smell that you get every year when you first turn on your furnace. Only this wasn’t the first time we turned on our furnace. It was already running. And when I switched it to air, which should not even have kicked on unless the temp got to 78, I smelled the burning. What’s up with that?

I could not go off and leave my house heating and burning. For all I knew, that thing would keep heating all day, until I reached my boiling point. I called Hick, who had sense enough to answer. I had already looked for the breaker in the box on the back wall of the walk-in closet in the master bathroom, installed by one H. Victorian when the house was built. He does mark thinks neatly with his sloppy writing.

“Should I turn off the breaker? On the bottom right?”

“Yeah. I’ll look at it when I get home. It’s the bottom three.”

So I tripped those three double bottom breakers, and took off to do my duty. The Pony and I had an appointment after school, so Hick was home before us. When we got there, he was out hammering on his shed. The breakers were back to normal. Neither heat nor air was running, because the temperature was 73 degrees inside. When interrogated later, Hick revealed that all he did was turn the breakers back on, and the air conditioner worked when he set it to 73.

I suppose when it comes to electronic doodads, Hick and Genius have the touch. Val Thevictorian does not.