Air Conditioning Man, a possibly sordid tale of cold air and ... things

I went to the gym today, because I'd been perturbed to see that even though yesterday I'd spent all day dehydrating, I still weighed two pounds more than I had in the middle of the week. 646 calories dutifully burned off, I staggered to the towel desk to hand back my damp towels. The woman behind the desk smiled and stared at me, and then read "I've almost finished ... my screenplay" and beamed at me. I've decided as a result of this that the Wan Chai California Fitness is the best branch, because they have the happiest person in charge of towels. Unlike the lady in Causeway Bay who gets cross if you put the towel an inch to the left of where her sign says it should be, or the uncommunicative chap in Central, in Wan Chai they have a cheery woman who'll read out the front of your t-shirt, as long as it has an amusing logo. Thanks Gerald!

(Gerald was the chap who gave me ten useful bits of advice, many, many years ago. And the eponymous t-shirt, more recently.)

I was in a hurry to get home, because we had an impending appointment from Air Conditioning Man.  Air Conditioning Man is a superhero of the Special Administrative Region, capable of curing all sorts of air conditioner related woes.  Unfortunately that's his own super power; it would be nice if he were also capable of arranging his visit with more than two hours' notice, but you can't have everything.

So I got a taxi back to Tin Hau, ran up the steps into the building, and then stood in the sweatbox of the lift until I was home again, and then waited for Air Conditioning Man to arrive.

Slightly disappointingly, it was two men, one young and the other a bit older and more rotund, with a glue gun, a harness and some pieces of carpet.

Now I know you're thinking, steady on, we didn't come here to read about some pervert's idea of a comfortable night in.  But it's not like that, you despicable people.  They had come to stick the carpet to the top of our air conditioning units, thus muffling the drips from above and assuring us of blissful slumber in the future.  What wonderful people they are.  And not perverts at all.

Although you really can't be sure in this day and age.  I'm not saying they're the kind of men who have strange fetishes about freon-free cooling devices and heavy duty electrical pumps, but if they were, it would be a rather convenient job for them to have, wouldn't it?

Not that there's anything wrong with that, of course.  I'm not prejudiced against men who want to do disgusting things to air conditioners.

I just don't believe they should do it while standing on my window ledge on the end of a harness, waving a glue gun and a bit of carpet in the night air before attaching it to the top of the air conditioner.

A few moments later, they were gone again.

I'm feeling a little bit guilty, if only because the dripping has been silent for the last two days, but then if nothing else, I gave some men, who probably don't derive any sort of sexual thrill from it, the opportunity to clamber out of my window and slightly modify the configuration of my air conditioning units.  Thank you, Air Conditioning Man.

But if I ever see you eyeing up my fridge, I'm going to have to send you away with a flea in your air, super powers or no super powers.