That Girl Moment #892: The Heat is ON.

I gotta tell you, I love me some air conditioning. I grew up with a dad who adored it and earned himself the moniker The Nanook of the North because of his incredible devotion to all things freon. MY mom and I learned to adapt, as all creatures, and so we accustomed ourselves to putting on blankets and snuggling up. We never turned it down because Dad's opinion on the whole thing was such a Dad's Opinion if you know what I mean:
"You can put more clothes on but you can only take so many off. Turn the air back up!"

Hence, my fashion statement of The Snuggie when I visit at Seth's house. It might be too cold, but at least it's not too hot!!

So I grew up in a house that had a lovely air conditioner. Then I went to places like Haiti and Mexico and Bolivia and learned how much I really did LOVE that magical machine that emits the coolest of breezes.

I could kiss that thing just now thinking about June in Haiti. I'm pretty convinced I sweet more than the average Sumo wrestler, so give me some air and I don't have to pat my pitties down, or use the J technique (named for an anonymous bff) in which one sticks tissues under her arms until she heads out to avoid the pit stains.

So when I arrived at my big brother Ryan's house in the Pacific Northwest last Sunday afternoon, I was in for a huge surprise.

The purpose of my trip was to visit my family but also take care of K, H, and E while mommy and daddy went on a grown-up vacation by themselves.

{I'm a very expensive babysitter. If you don't have the kind of dirt on me that my brother has.}

So Monday morning, Ryan and Shan left the house for their trip, and I was left with my three extremely Marvelous and Mischievous nieces, ages 6, 4, and 2.


Now if that doesn't make you sweat a la C and C Music Factory, nothing will.

What made me sweat even more was that for the life of me, I could not get that blessed air conditioner to work. I maneuvered it, tried to change the settings, made sure it was turned to cool, and at one point may or may not of hit the thing a couple of times out of sheer frustration. The upper level of the house is where we spend most of our time, and it was Hotter Than Haiti up there. I kept messing with the A/C just hoping I could get it to work. Finally, although I am opposed to bothering mommy and daddy too much when they are on vacation and away from the girls, I broke down and asked my sweet brother what in the Holy Hill Country was wrong with his blessed air conditioner.


Then came the dreaded words:
"We don't have Air Conditioning."

Eh.

No WONDER that piece of machinery would not work! And it was hotter than a firecracker on the Fourth of July in that beautiful house. From the outside you couldn't tell that it was the House of Sweating and More Sweating.

I opened all the windows and put out all the fans. Then I melted some Tillamook cheese right on the counter.

Okay, so that last part was a total lie. BUTICOULDHAVEPROBABLYIFIWANTEDTO.

The girls were hot, I was HOT (not the good kind--sweat is not cute, despite what they may tell you (jillian michaels!) and I did not have as much patience as I should have at times because it was so blasted hot.

When I would go around the house mocking my brother: "Nobody has A/C out here. blah blah blah. Everyone just opens their windows. blah blah blah. The breeze is so cool out here. blah blah blah."

I thought they were crazy. It was hotter than a tamale tucked inside a jalepeno.

Fast forward through two more days of bitterness and BO.

On Thursday evening, Ryan and Shan walk in to a huge reception from the crowd of small people and to an exhausted and overheated Aunt Wah, whose new bangs were caked and matted nicely right to her forehead. It's all the rage for missionaries visiting Haiti, I hear.


Ryan and Shannon begin to laugh heartily once they say their hellos to their three young children. I was not in such humor.
Finally, my brother says, "Why is the furnace running outside?"

I managed to have a slight amount of self-control and did not say something smart alecky as I so deeply desired to in my heat-induced temper shortage.

Then it dawns on me. After my brother told me there was no A/C, I didn't bother to turn anything off because I was so incredibly bitter I didn't want to look at the stupid thing again. And since it was set to cool, the heat would never have kicked on at all. Right?


Wrong. Of course, I had been running the furnace on accident since the evening they left. So all of my bitterness at my poor brother was ill-focused.

I was the HeatMaster. ME! I had sabotaged this house and my poor nieces had pit stains all because of me!

It was my fault, and since there was no one to blame but me, I was in bad humor with the many jokes that came next.

Such as:
"Hey Laur, is it hot in here or what? Heh heh heh."
"You're never gonna live this one down."

and my personal favorite:
"That is SUCH a That Girl moment! You better blog about that!"

Once we got the heat off, it cooled down in the house pretty quickly. Still, like Darcy, I love my a/c most ardently and never wish to be parted from it again.



The furnace? Now that's a different story.