Those of you who did not grow up in the desert southwest ( that's pretty much just you Junie) may be unfamiliar with the hulking contraption pictured above. In the vernacular it's known as a Swamp Cooler, but is more properly called an "Evaporative Cooler" When I was growing up all the houses had one perched on the roof. Forget Memorial Day as the start of summer, for us it was the servicing of the swamp cooler that heralded the months of summer fun. Its a pretty simple machine; a pump pumps water up to a six armed manifold called a spider that then drizzles the water over fiber mats that line the walls of the cooler, a belt driven fan then draws the air cooled by evaporation down into the duct work of the house and out blows nice cool air. In theory it works...but mechanical failures are frequent, and low humidity is a must. Back in the day we knew how to fix our cooler ourselves and often did, replacing the pump, pads, float valves, spider and belt as needed...but years of living away, I had thought I lost my mad swamp cooler skills. But that proved not to be entirely true, I still managed to replace some parts and I would have been able to claim a complete victory, but the belt was slipping and Mom had to call in the repairman after all, but I got 2 out of three! Still the days of the swamp cooler are numbered. More and more people are installing refrigerated air units and even though I will miss the ego boosts that come from vanquishing the Swamp Thing I am looking forward to an A/C . Those trips up the ladder and onto the roof are getting scarier with each passing year!
What with my poor memory, I laughed out loud when I saw the swamp thing on my roof in your blog. You did a great job with it this year! I am afraid my days of climbing the ladder are long gone. I'm glad you can still do it and even better, that you know what to do when you get there. Remember how much fun you had climbing on the roof for no reason at all!?
ReplyDeleteWe hopped around up there like a bunch of mountain goats! I still dont mind the roof itself, but the ladder is another thing entirely. It makes me weak in the knees! Funny, I never minded it as a kid...no pun intended.
ReplyDeleteOmar, We did not climb around up there for no reason! On the contrary it was the most strategic location in the neighborhood! You could spot the enemy coming and pelt them with eggs long before they had a clue what hit them!Oh the fun we had! The down side was when you pulled up the ladder to keep the enemy away only to have half of it fall to the ground! Then you were in a pickle! Thank heavens for neutral neighbors!
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