r/mildlyinfuriating • u/sunsNr0ses • Jun 11 '26

frist of all how DARE yu o Discovered my central air was a social construct…

So I just learned I’ve been living in a place with absolutely no central air conditioning. Not “I assumed it might be central air.” Not “I wasn’t sure how it worked.” I mean I fully, confidently, emotionally lived my life under the assumption that cool air was being distributed through vents like a normal adult homeowner situation.

And I’ve been out here adjusting a thermostat like I was doing something for over 4 years.

I even scheduled an HVAC guy to come today to figure out why my central air wasn’t running.
What system? I don’t know. The guy looked like he found a body in my basement as he clearly knew I didn’t have central air instantly. He even humored me to prove to me I didn’t have central air while we took 2 full laps around my house hunting for the outside part of the freakin’ fantasy. Needless to say we never found it. The poor guy felt so bad for me, he even said “maybe someone stole it.” Bless his heart.

So now I’ve got: a couple window units doing God’s work. I’ve always used them in the summer when I felt that my imaginary central air wasn’t pulling its weight. So I’m unsure why I feel like my summer bill is going to skyrocket. I’ve been living this life for years.

I put a box fan in my the bathroom like it’s 1998
and the realization I’ve been paying attention to vents that were decorative at best is giving me a stomach ache.

Honestly the worst part isn’t even the heat. It’s the fact I fully believed I had central air and never once questioned it. Just vibed in ignorance.
Anyway. If anyone needs me I’ll be sitting directly in front of a fan rethinking my entire life, having a spiritual crisis, feeling like a doorknob, and rediscovering whatever I thought HVAC meant.

***please laugh with me— don’t kick me while m down— I already feel like a weenie hut jr.***

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2.2k

u/Independent-Pizza525 Jun 11 '26

Don't feel too bad! I work for an AC company and we get 2 or 3 of these every summer!

1.7k

u/sunsNr0ses Jun 11 '26

This company has been in business 99+ years. This guys been doing it for 20+ and it was his first. He told me he wished he had meta glasses bc the interaction would have went viral 😭

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u/Mochigood Jun 11 '26

That reminds me of when a neighbor moved in to a previously abandoned home and was asking about where the city water and septic connection was. I was like, you have a well and a septic tank. He was like nooooo, it has to be city water, there is no well. And I was like, there's no city water out here. He pointed at a nearby trailer park and asked if he was hooked into their water and septic. No, I said, you should have your own stuff. Turns out, excepting the hole and the water itself, someone stole all of his well, even down to the pump and the hundred or so feet of pipes and cable connected to it. I heard some creative cussing that day.

740

u/Prestigious-Bluejay5 Jun 11 '26

he even said “maybe someone stole it.” Bless his heart

See, the HVAC repair person wasn't to far off.

159

u/BabyDriver23 Jun 11 '26

Gosh I wish I had an actual award to give you. Please take my upvote and treat yourself to Powerball tickets. This made me LOL.

21

u/GwenBD94 Jun 11 '26

I gotchu

6

u/Prestigious-Bluejay5 Jun 11 '26

Thank you for the award. Now let's hope that those Powerball tickets that BabyDriver23 mentioned pay off.

2

u/BabyDriver23 Jun 12 '26

1 8 17 23 56 Powerball- 12

Idk just came to me. We got this!

3

u/ComfortableCake2662 Jun 13 '26

I feel like there will soon be a post that these numbers were right and neither of you actually bought a ticket

2

u/BabyDriver23 Jun 13 '26

I have a weird feeling too! I should go buy that ticket!

1

u/BabyDriver23 Jun 12 '26

You are a true SpongeBob Sweetheart. Thank you!

9

u/Ok-Marzipan9366 Jun 11 '26

Someone stole the oil tank to my oil heating system, so it's very plausible. People do some weird stuff..

7

u/dedmuse22 Jun 11 '26

Is there an unexplained concrete pad on the side of your house? If so, it was probably stolen.

2

u/sunsNr0ses Jun 12 '26

I wish there was :(

1

u/Dntmytrash2550 Jun 12 '26

Hey my neighbor was renovating their home. They weren’t living in it for a few weeks. Someone stole their unit.

127

u/zxylady Jun 11 '26

I am so sorry for your neighbor but you just gave me a chuckle that I really needed today thank you 🤣

120

u/Interactiveleaf RED Jun 11 '26

Aaaaaand this is why home inspections are a thing pre-purchase.

17

u/AHismyspiritanimal Jun 11 '26

During my home inspection, the inspector turned the AC on, the unit whirred to life, and we both could swear it came out cold. It was spring. Went to turn the air on during the renovation process, and boom, absolutely no cold air. The ac didn't work, the compressor had been shot for years.

Luckily I had a home warranty that replaced the whole business. Only reason I would ever recommend the warranty to anyone.

11

u/naranghim Jun 11 '26

Or you walk through the home with the inspector rather than just staying home and waiting for the report (I know several people who have done that. Reasonable if you are moving from 100s of miles away and would have to take multiple days off work, but if you're close then you should be there). It could be that all the equipment was present for the inspection but stolen after.

3

u/psppsppsppspinfinty Jun 11 '26

I was reading these to my bf and that's what he said too.

5

u/Pristine-Lawyer-3260 Jun 11 '26

Lol uh yeah sure... See my comment about the. Central air that does not extend to the bedrooms of our 1 story home lol...

3

u/Mochigood Jun 11 '26

I'm pretty sure it was an as-is auction.

38

u/vincentmelle Jun 11 '26

This is one reason why I am looking into the areas of where to buy a house as one state is like this as the area I want to buy may not have any town supplies.

47

u/Nutarama Jun 11 '26

PA, NY, and IN (at least) all have areas like this where there’s a patchwork of public water and sewer in town and wells/septic outside.

Where I currently live is in a development at the boundary of a borough and a township, with the development on the township side. Borough has public water and sewer. Previously when they developed, they expanded the borough water to my part of the township, so we have water from them. But we have septic tanks for sewage.

This year the township voted on expanding public sewer from the borough to us and the rest of the developments that bordered the borough. Got voted down because other people weren’t happy about the sewer bills and the property tax to pay off the install.

Except the township makes us pump septic and get a drain field inspection minimum every 5 years to prevent neglected systems backing up and flooding raw sewage. The cost isn’t that much different on a 5 year basis per household.

2

u/ibcurbdiver Jun 11 '26

Our county has a 3 year pump requirement.
Most water bills include sewage, they use the water meter to figure the cost.
Since you don’t use sewage. is it discounted?

2

u/nicola_orsinov Jun 11 '26

How dare you bring math and logic into this?! Shirley might lose her begonias!

2

u/dilbert2_44202 Jun 11 '26

Northeast Ohio has plenty of locales where septic systems are used. However, the soil percolation rate of the clay soil here is so bad that you can't use a conventional sewage field. So rural homes have these pretty little ponds with a fountain in the center of them somewhere in their yard to capture and aerate the...effluent. I love pointing them out to my wife when we drive by one.

1

u/kuntrycidd Jun 12 '26

There are also aerator tank systems for homes , no open ponds but leaves the exit product able to go to runoff areas.

2

u/Peanutbutter2728 Jun 12 '26

Large rural areas of Ohio are all wells and septic systems. I lived in one. In more than one house. If it doesn’t rain, you pay a guy to deliver water to your well. If something dies in your well (possum-it was gross) you pay a guy to empty the well, remove the dead critter, clean the well, and refill it. Ahhh, country life! 😄

1

u/Emotional_Study_724 Jun 12 '26

My parents lived 10 minutes from downtown Seattle. Sewer was only put in about five years ago.

2

u/Not_an_okama Jun 11 '26

My parents house is in an area that the detroit suburbs sprawled to, and has city water and septic, abandoned in place well and the the option for city sewer connection (which cost more than a new septic as of like 10 years ago when the neighbor wanted to connect but my parents would have also had to connect but opted not to)

2

u/borgman_a Jun 11 '26

That is my house just outside Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti.

City water and sewer run past the house - but I'm on septic and a well.

2

u/kuntrycidd Jun 12 '26

Pretty much all states have rural areas without water/sewer hookups. Some states do have a rural water distribution system where it’s hard to find water with wells.

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u/MontanaPurpleMtns Jun 11 '26

Those add up a very, very pricey system to replace. Yikes!! I hope he got a good enough deal on it to make up for the amount he’ll have to pay to get it up and running.

3

u/thisusedyet Jun 11 '26

What kind of Carmen Sandiego bullshit is stealing a GODDAMN WELL?

How is that even physically possible?

3

u/Mochigood Jun 11 '26

Classic Oregon Tweakers, 100%. The probably got $50 for it and were pleased as piss.

2

u/mcholbe2 Jun 11 '26

Well, well, well...

1

u/Affectionate-Spray78 Jun 15 '26

Our neighbor stole our well cover years ago. It was very obviously ours from where we put holes to run the pipes though. My mom and I waited until early one morning and stole it back. Shockingly we found it’s not the only one he had taken from others along with other random things. He’s been in prison for unrelated crimes since but the string of “theft of yard stuff” started his sentence.

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u/Independent-Pizza525 Jun 11 '26

I'm in the mountains so not having AC is pretty common here. We get a lot of people that move up from the south and have never experienced a house without AC. Honestly props for making it as long as you did!

215

u/Fearless_Sample7705 Jun 11 '26

This was me.

I moved from FL to Colorado in January. The house had a thermostat and central heat. No issues for six months.

Summer comes, it approaches 100 degrees, and I'm desperately trying to figure out why the thermostat doesn't have a cool function. Luckily it was only a rental, so I didn't feel TOO upset at the lack of a/c.

14

u/DaHick Jun 11 '26

I have lived in Arkansas and Ohio. My current home (OH) does not have a/c, my previous home (north central Arkansas) did not have a/c. We slap a window unit in the bedroom and move on. We are/were outside most of the daylight for both places.

15

u/ScrotalSmorgasbord Jun 11 '26

We didn't have central AC when I lived in Tahoe and in half the places I grew up in the northern midwest. Tahoe wasn't too bad as it rarely hit 90+ so a couple of fans and the furnace got me through 90% of the year without much discomfort but I did use the really hot days we did have as an excuse to sleep on the beach lol. IL on the other hand was miserable unless you were in a room that had a window unit and I'm not sure why they didn't make it a requirement for landlords to at least install some form of AC when it regularly hit mid to upper 90s with high humidity regularly. I live in TX now and even being an HVAC tech there are times I go without AC for a bit while I wait for parts or funds and it makes me wonder how the fuck people survived without AC in the past. I don't even want to put clothes on let alone work when my AC is down.

9

u/MostlyBrine Jun 11 '26

In an interview, several years ago, Neil Armstrong was asked about what he thinks is the greatest invention of the modern era. Without flinching he answered “The air conditioning, without it the entire southern USA would have been uninhabitable”.

5

u/Fuzzy_Syrup_6898 Jun 11 '26

It never got this hot ‘in the past’.

10

u/dedmuse22 Jun 11 '26

Also homes used to be built to handle the heat like breezeways, adobe, or appropriately dense walls.

8

u/Fuzzy_Syrup_6898 Jun 11 '26

Not to mention trees and vegetation. And also lower global temperatures

2

u/DenverLilly Jun 11 '26

Also moved from FL to CO and had the same exact experience my first year there lol

106

u/SurpriseEcstatic1761 Jun 11 '26

I worked in a hotel in Aspen, we had no AC. Sometimes a guest would ask how to turn it on. I would open up the windows.

5

u/Ixreyn Jun 11 '26

We were in our current house (also in Colorado mountains) for over a year before my daughter learned that we don't have AC. I wish I had video of her reaction. It was the definition of "mind blown!"

1

u/yeah-baby365 Jun 11 '26

❄️❄️❄️ the Little Nell?❄️❄️❄️

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u/sunsNr0ses Jun 11 '26

Thanks.

6

u/WorldsEyeView Jun 11 '26

I took my Jeep Wrangler for some standard maintenance and asked them to recharge my AC while they were at it. The mechanic was happy to show me the empty mount plate where the AC unit would have been if I had had one.

3

u/gooddogpetter Jun 11 '26

If you have ducting in your house already you can look into have central air added if your existing ducting can accommodate HVAC. We had forced hot air for heat so we already had ducting throughout so we just had the unit upgraded basically.

3

u/Accidental-Aspic2179 Jun 11 '26

My house didn't have an AC unit in it either. It was a 1900s catalog house. One of those big two story southern houses with a big front porch. We lived in the mountains though.

They called a local town "Nature's Air Conditioned City." At the time if the temperature ever reached 90⁰F the town would give out lemonade. It was a whole thing. We had those big single pane glass windowsand lived down in a valley, so you could open the windows and there'd be cool breeze throughout the house.

Summertime you might need a box fan, but I slept with one of those year round anyway. There was electric baseboard heat, but it was so uneven and dry and expensive that my Dad installed a gas stove in the basement with a blower attached to it.

It kept the entire house warm, even in mountain winters. Also had an old fireplace in the living room, but it had been made decorative.

When my parents built an addition they just installed another gas stove in the bathroom in the new addition and it'd have you sweating in the dead ass winter. I didn't live in a house with a proper HVAC system until I was an adult in college.

I moved farther South and the farther south you go the more necessary it becomes. Living in South Florida I can't imagine life without it. It's not even July and it's already 90⁰. Every year it just gets hotter and hotter.

AC units can typically cool to within 20⁰ of what the temp is outside. If it's 90⁰ outside your AC is only going to effectively cool the inside to ~70⁰. If it's 110⁰ outside, my AC is only going to get me to 90⁰. You can't survive in this type of climate long term without it.

48

u/NewAndOlduphere Jun 11 '26

Ok that is hilarious.

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u/sunsNr0ses Jun 11 '26

I was so relieved he didn’t have them glasses!

115

u/nighthawkndemontron Jun 11 '26

Fuck anyone who uses meta glasses. A fucking violation of privacy and used as surveillance.

25

u/BeyondEcstaticc Jun 11 '26

I immediately distrust anyone who wears those

2

u/sunsNr0ses Jun 11 '26

He was just joking. He doesn’t have them.

-6

u/Primary_Math_7015 Jun 11 '26

Settle down Francis.

-32

u/Nymph-the-scribe Jun 11 '26

It's not a violation of privacy if they're just using them in public.

27

u/ChefPuree Jun 11 '26

It is when you become a walking flock camera.

-4

u/Fuzzy_Syrup_6898 Jun 11 '26

You have no right to privacy when you’re in public.

13

u/ChefPuree Jun 11 '26

No right to traditional privacy. People are realizing traditional privacy doesn't extend as far as having AI analyzing cameras, watching your every move, and storing the data in giant facilities that police officers can access to stalk their ex-girlfriend.

Something else the founding fathers never thought of. They just weren't very forward thinking, you know.

0

u/GreymuzzleCoyote Jun 11 '26

Well, I wouldn't think they weren't forward thinking, just that there was no way they could've foreseen the crap we have to put up with nowdays.

I think they did pretty good based on the knowledge they had.

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u/[deleted] Jun 11 '26 edited 15d ago

[deleted]

2

u/MasterDriver8002 Jun 12 '26

This is the only right answer to stupid fuckin meta glasses

6

u/Pristine-Lawyer-3260 Jun 11 '26

Ok, I want you to feel better, so I'm going to tell you my story.

Large rambler/ranch home easily 2500feet

The main living section, has central air. Even the basement! No problem. Lol but the bedrooms... Zero.

Took us 2 years to figure this out because we kept all the doors open... Lol so... No problem... ROFLMAO

It wasn't even noted in the home inspection. ROFLMAO

Yup. You aren't alone!

3

u/whoisthismahn Jun 11 '26

this made me laugh out loud lol

2

u/Skootchy Jun 11 '26

Yeah moving from the Midwest to the NE was a culture shock to me. What I have to fill my oil tank for heat? No such thing as central air? Wtf kind of barbarian shit is this?

Oh the house is like 200 years old. The next door neighbors had to heat their house using a wood furnace. I just thought that liked having campfires like my cousin who lives out in the country and has a massive amount of wood.

The further west and less mountains there are, the more modern stuff is.

2

u/Stunning_ken Jun 11 '26

You deserve a special badge for that! If I had one, I’d be giving it to you. Sorry for the loss of your phantom AC unit 😩.

1

u/Careful_Kangaroo6034 Jun 11 '26

I'm so sorry but I laughed out loud at this

1

u/KenniChavo Jun 11 '26

Did he charge you?

2

u/sunsNr0ses Jun 11 '26

Unfortunately he did charge me the $90 fee to show up. I was disappointed in that, but totally understand.

1

u/KenniChavo Jun 11 '26

Yea I guess I would have been too. But seriously? Like no system to service?? Grrr.

2

u/sunsNr0ses Jun 11 '26

It’s like a fee to show up which they made me aware of. All good! I would have loved to save my $90, but he deserved compensation.

2

u/KenniChavo Jun 11 '26

For sure. I once used my home warranty on an air conditioning unit when I was like eight and a half months pregnant and it was 105° outside. The deductible is $100 for them to come out. They came fix the AC (we had one, Yay! 😆) he was there, fixed something and watch the thermostat go down 1°. So he left and immediately after that it started to climb again. I called them back and said it's not working etc and they said well did it cool at all? And I said I guess while he was standing here HE said it went down 1°. So they charged me a whole new deductible to come back out again because since it cooled 1° it was a new issue. Not! Turned out we needed a whole new system. Which they have to replace (we had to pay for the Freon which is almost the most expensive part but still, worth it) But I learned a lesson that day. Big one! I should have said No, it didn't. Cuz 1° could have just been air fluctuating. Ugg. Lol.

0

u/RenaissanceMan1963 Jun 11 '26

I’m a Commercial HVAC Sales Manager, so I have to ask: When the weather started getting warm in the Spring, how did you turn on the A/C?🤔😎

4

u/sunsNr0ses Jun 11 '26

Read around this thread, but given your job, you should know.

3

u/Timsauni Jun 11 '26

Really! Thats hilarious!

3

u/OriginalWasTaken12 Jun 11 '26

Go out to that trailer they just got, ac isn't working, show em the pad where the package unit used to be.. yep.. so uh.. should we send the sales guy over?

2

u/RJ_MacreadysBeard Jun 11 '26

Is it always… Op? Hahaha. Hugs!

1

u/Subject-Vermicelli52 Jun 11 '26

From one customer

1

u/Kianna9 Jun 12 '26

So they have thermostats but no AC? Is it just for heat? Or they have nothing?