Mini Me has the hottest room in our house.  We have a classic split-level home, built in the 1960’s.  The HVAC system is in the crawl space, situated right next to Mini Me’s room.  It’s fine in the spring and summer months, but once we fire the heat up, it’s like hell down there.

I tried to fix the problem a couple of years ago.  I bought new vents and put the magnet/block thingies in them-to block his vents.  The HVAC guy had to come for some reason and he told me I was heating the entire crawl space.  I had to remove those things. It was a mess. I was going through a caulk stage and had caulked the new vents to the wall.

Mini Me has a habit of turning the air conditioning on in the night, if he is burning up.  We have woken to the house at 50 degrees before, thinking that the heat was broken. Soooooo, when we recently turned the heat on, and he started complaining about how hot it is downstairs, I decided to buy him a ceiling fan.  I am not sure why I had not thought of that before.

Mothah was here, so she and I went to Home Depot.  Mothah wanted the fan to be white and only have a single light attachment, unlike the one in our kitchen that has three separate light things.  The only two white fans they had were 42″ fans, and I quickly deemed them too small.  The one I had seen online was a Hunter fan that had gray-white-washed looking blades, was 46″ inches, and had one light attachment.  It was only $119.  They had that fan at Home Depot.  Mothah said she thought that was just too much money and we should go home and look online.  Against my better judgment, that’s what we did.

I found a 44″ white fan with one light attachment on the Home Depot website for $49.97 and I ordered it-against my better judgment.  It came the next day and sat in the dining room on (top of some giant speakers that need to be moved down to the playroom) for over a week.  It started to get colder outside and I started to worry about waking up to 50 degrees inside, so day before yesterday, I decided to hang the damn fan.

I know how to hang ceiling fans. I hung the one in our kitchen. I moved one from one room to another.  I know how to swap out light fixtures. Electricity does not scare me.  I took my ladder and my electric screwdriver and some other tools down to Mini Me’s room.  I had to stand on his bed part of the time, which was a real pain in the ass because he has this real cushiony mattress topper that Mothah bought him, and my feet kept sinking into it like I was walking in snow.  Also, I don’t have the best control over my hands anymore-either carpal tunnel or arthritis-so I kept dropping screws and having to get down on the floor and search for them.

I finally got the fan up there.  I cleaned up the mess before I even tried it out-because-I knew it was going to work.  I turned it on and pulled the light cord. The light worked. No surprise there.  I pulled the fan cord.  It started up and was making a terrible noise. Damnation. I got the directions out and read the troubleshooting tips.  It said that any noises should go away in 24 hours.  This noise did not sound like any noise that was going away in 24 hours.  It also said that I should take it all apart and tighten the motor and the housing and whatnot.  Oh, fuckety-fuck me. Ok. This meant I had to take all the blades off and everything. I took it all down and tightened it all up and put it back.  The noise was still there.  I could not accept this noise. I took the damn thing apart AGAIN, checked it all, tightened it all, and put it all back.  The noise was STILL there. I collapsed on Mini Me’s bed. He walked in a few minutes later.  “Oh! a fan!” he said. Then, we both started laughing because the noise was really loud.  I told him that I simply could not take the fan down again right then and I would deal with it tomorrow, because, you know-after all, tomorrow is another day.

So, yesterday, I was in my bed, thinking about having to take that damn fan down.  My husband was working from home and it was about 10am. He came upstairs and asked what I was doing-I guess, you know, since it was 10am and I was still in bed and it was Tuesday.  I told him that I was just laying there, dreading taking the fan down.  He laughed and said, “well, you could just pull the covers up over your head.”  So I did that for about 10 more minutes.

I got my ass up and took the damn fan down and packed it back in the box and went to Home Depot.  The girl in the “Returns” department asked me why I was returning the fan. “Because it makes an abhorrent sound!” I said, completely exasperated.  She started laughing.  I smiled.  She started typing something into her computer.  “You know,” she said, “I think that is the best reason I have ever heard for anybody bringing anything back-because it makes an abhorrent sound!”  I realized that she was typing my reason for returning it into the computer.  In less than five minutes, I was headed back to the ceiling fan department.

I left Home Depot that day with the original Hunter fan that I was going to buy in the first place, as well as the huge medallion I would need to cover the ceiling where the light fixture had once been.  When I got home, I just did not have it in me to hang it.  I asked Mini Me if I could just wait until tomorrow because-you know– after all, tomorrow is another day. He said fine.

This morning we woke up to the house being 50 degrees. I mean we were freezing.  We thought the heat was broken.  JC went to check the thermostat.  When he came upstairs, he said, “I think you will need to talk to Mini Me about turning on the AC”….. There was no question about whether I would hang the new damn fan or not.  I hung it.  It was heavier. It was a little more complicated, but man, is it pretty.  The inside of the lighting attachment is ceramic.  The light cover is actual glass! The other abhorrent fan had a plastic light cover.  I was dropping screws left and right and cussing a blue streak.  Luckily, nobody was here but me and the cat.  When that fan was up, I cleaned up my mess before I tried it, because, again, I knew it was going to work. I turned on the switch on the wall and pulled the light cord.  It came on. No surprise there. I pulled the fan cord. That fan started up, smooth as silk. No noise whatsoever.  I only had to hang it ONCE, and it is sheer perfection.  I’m telling you-you get what you pay for. Oh, and Mini Me and I decided we like the dark side of the blades best! 🙂