And having a window unit in the living room makes an enormous difference and I am grateful they do "loaners" like this at my air conditioning place. I have no idea how common this is - my brother and sister in law didn't get one during their weeklong outage. I know I've griped about how my dealership doesn't do loaner cars, but I'd rather have a loaner A/C unit when it's hot. (Especially since nearly all the work I've had done on the car recently is something that takes 2 hours or less. And I'm one of the lucky few, apparently, who DOESN'T have a defective airbag that will need replacing - I checked)
But then the downside. I had taken a cool-ish bath with Epsom salts to try to soothe my hives (it helped, some). When I got out and went in the hall, I smelled something plasticky. Or rather, like toasting electrical insulation. That's not ever something you want to smell in a house.
The guys had left the blower running (on "on" rather than on "auto," which is where I usually leave it) to circulate air in the house and at first I thought it was that because the smell was near it (also they had worked on it). So I panicked and shut it down.
Then I went in my bedroom. The smell there was stronger. I had left the air conditioner running to keep the place cool and my first thought was, "Oh no, did it work too hard and burn itself out?" So I shut it down and felt of it - it didn't FEEL warm. And it has a couple of failsafes (breakers) on its electrical system that I think would shut it down if something went wrong.
Then I realized the ceiling fan wasn't turning. Jumped up on the bed and felt of the motor housing. Burned my fingertip, and also noticed that the smell was strongest close to it. I switched it off from the wall switch. And then I immediately called my dad, who knows a little more than I do about electricity, to verify that I wouldn't wake up in the middle to the night to my fire alarm going off because the fault in the motor somehow crawled up the wiring and set the attic wiring on fire. (Yeah, well, writing it out sounds really illogical, but I was tired and it had been an extremely long day).
Obviously, seeing as I'm still here, sitting in my living room, it was fine.
But I feel kind of like I'm in the reality show, "So What Is Going To Break Next?"
Of course, it's more likely that a lot of stuff in this house was installed about the same time, and so it's reaching the end of its life at about the same time. And really, a ceiling fan going out is a minor issue, because ceiling fans (I checked the Lowe's website) are fairly cheap (well, compared to air conditioning systems): unless you go super-high-style, they're less than $200. And I'm guessing I could buy one, call Mr. Electric (or whatever that franchise is called; I have their card because they were able to send a guy to fix a light switch for me before) and get them out to install it. I THINK they won't need to go into the attic to deal with it? I hope.
The biggest issue would be clearing all the STUFF out of my room - the overflow books, the piled-up clothing I need to put away, get the stuffies temporarily out of there, because they make me look super-eccentric to a stranger. (I know: I should not care but I kind of do).
The good news is I have a floor lamp in there to read by, so it's not even very urgent....I can get the air conditioning sorted out and then think about it later. And I have the fun of picking out a new ceiling fan? I guess? Maybe that's fun? (I looked online a little. Lowe's and Home Depot and places like that have the relatively inexpensive kinds, but then there are some places that have "Style" or "Euro" in their names where the fans run something like $500. Unless the $500 fan comes with its own installer to deliver it and put it in, and comes to be guaranteed for more than twice as long as the $200 fan, I'm going with a fairly simple-model Hunter from Lowe's. I will have to look at my Consumer's Reports guide to see if there are brands to avoid....). And I can make an appointment to have it installed and since it's not urgent, I can make it for some Friday when I can just hang out at home, or take the first appointment of the day.
And yes, I know, theoretically one can replace a ceiling fan oneself, but (a) I'd need help, and getting someone out to help would be hard and (b) I tend to prefer letting an expert deal with anything involving wiring or gas. (Apparently you can get installation through Lowe's but I don't know. I had some tsuris with the guy who installed my hot water heater through them because they put him on too many jobs at once)
I SUPPOSE the motors on those things can be replaced, but I have no idea of the manufacturer or the model, and it might cost as much to buy the motor as to buy an inexpensive phone.
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