The auditorium windows at the top, the downspout at the left
Yesterday afternoon, Beth and I met with Simon, a representative of the second air-conditioning company we’d invited to give us a quote. We’ve been trying to find an inexpensive way to install air-conditioning in the parish hall’s upstairs auditorium so that we can rent it in the summer.
Our electrician recommended Mitsubishi’s MrSlim system, since you can install these small units just under the ceiling and run each one individually, requiring less electricity over time. They’re also supposed to be cheaper than the large installations for which we’ve already received quotes–but we’re not sure about that because we haven’t yet got a quote for the small system (more on that in a minute).
Anyway, the three of us are standing in front of the parish hall looking up at the windows of the auditorium and the downspouts running from the roof to the ground. Simon is saying, “Yeah, if we run the copper tubing along the leaders there, you won’t be able to see a thing–” and I’m looking at one of our stray cats, who’s sitting on the sill of a ground-level window.
This cat is staring at me, wild-eyed, trying to decide whether to run or not, and I’m wondering why it isn’t.
Ah, I see.
Somehow the cat has got its paws on a dead squirrel. It must have dragged it to the windowsill, since the squirrel hadn’t died there–it’d been flattened by a car either in the street or on the driveway in front of the parish hall.
So there are Beth and I, trying to give Simon a good impression of the church and us as potential clients, and there’s a crazy black cat with a dead squirrel, nature gray in tooth and claw (the squirrel’s a little old). Embarrassing.
He didn’t say anything–maybe he didn’t notice–and neither did Beth or I.
While we gave Simon the tour of the auditorium, we also didn’t say anything about Sam, the first HVAC guy, measuring the auditorium and plugging numbers into his computer. What was Sam doing there? We’d shown him around a week ago, but then he asked if he could come back on Monday morning to double-check his measurements and he promised us a quote by Tuesday morning. It was now Tuesday afternoon.
Simon gave us his card and a brochure, then got back into his pristine white Hummer and drove off. “Hmm, air conditioning must be a good business to be in,” said Beth. All I could think was, What a mess, but maybe no one noticed. And what is Sam doing here?
Living the Non-profit Life 