#hvac-jobs

[leadvalets]

Only Use The Most Skilled HVAC Contractor

Florida is one of the main areas that have a humid subtropical climate. Outdoor condenser coils should be checked for damage and thoroughly cleaned. Someone will be right out to diagnose the problem and begin to make the necessary repairs. When extreme weather plays havoc, it’s nice to know you can return home and make yourself comfortable with a solid heating or air conditioning to maintain a…

[toytowns]

I'm living such an amazing life right now I worked so hard for this

(I did the dishes)

[the-fairy-dogmother]

Imma talk about dog training and behavior for a sec. Hope the dogblr bus doesn't run me over.

I wanna talk about NRMs, or, No Reward Markers. For those who do not know what a marker is, it is basically a cue that communicates to a dog the moment they get something right, or wrong. Clickers are the most well known markers. Some people, myself included, use a different marker for different reward placements and also to signify what type of reward the dog can expect. "Yes" is the marker I use when I want the dog to come and collect a food reward from my hand. "Good" is what I use when I am delivering the reward to the dog's mouth. Etcetera and so on.

No Reward Markers can be used to signify to the dog that the behavior they have just offered will not yield any reward. I most often use "Cheater" in agility for missed weave poles and missed contacts. It marks the exact moment the mistake was made and also that the dog should start over. "No" is a word that means the behavior they are doing will not yield any reward and they should stop and try something different. They are different in that "cheater" asks to start the same behavior over again whereas "no" communicates that they should switch tactics because there is opportunity for reward but rewards will not be accessible with that behavior.

Now, with that being said, I do not use them for all dogs or in all contexts. Some argue that they squash drive and motivation and I agree that they can if not carefully considered and used correctly for the dog that you are training. They have their place. Wally has never heard a NRM in agility and he never will. But when we shape behaviors for tricks at home he might hear "no" if he's continually offering the same incorrect behavior. For example, he lives by the assumption that is offered any object he should put all his mantis sticks in or on it. Which is cute, but he gets very frustrated very fast if I just ignore it and wait for him to do something closer to what I'm after. If I give him a "no" he will immediately switch tactics. And in that case, I would argue that it's more humane to give him the information that prevents the frustration in the first place.

Now, using NRMs when teaching a skill is one thing, but it turns into a whole other beast when we start talking about applying it to behavior modification sessions and exercises. This is where we're at a much higher risk of increasing frustration rather than helping the dog understand what is expected. This is because when we're applying any behavior modification tactic the dog is likely already under some stress and we need to hold their hands and help them switch tactics, rather than expecting them to be able to problem solve through their stress. This is especially true when they have not yet mastered the skill expected of them in outside contexts and/or when we move too quickly through a desensitization/remedial exposure& socialization plan.

And, the real reason I started this post. Story time!

Yesterday we realized our furnace died when we tried to turn on the heat and nothing happened. Today we are having a new one installed. Normally, for contractors, I just put all the dogs away somewhere that they won't be in the way. Especially since contractors are often punching holes in the house and doing other things that can be Very Concerning To Dogs. But Poki made it loud and clear that she was not happy to be excluded and because we're hoping she's with potatoes, I decided the least stressful thing for her would be a settle session with high value rewards. We put the TV on for some background noise and grabbed her leash. At first, contractors leaving/coming through the front door earned a BROOOOF ( as they should ) and I was luring her with the treats back into her down. I decided this was not too difficult for her because she was easily redirected and it never progressed beyond one boof. After the first hour or so, she would hear a contractor going up/down the stairs and they earned a broof only 50-60% of the time. At that point, I decided to try the NRM "no" since she wasn't showing significant signs of stress. And within 20 minutes (or about 4 contractors passes) contractors appearing on stairs only earned a glance and then a look to me. We are now sitting on the sofa, definitely had her dinner for brunch in my lap 🤣 and watching as they go up and down to and from the front door, earning tidbits for keeping quiet, holding her down, and checking in with me instead of broofing.

In summary, we started by spelling out what we wanted her to do and started off with a ridiculously high rate of reinforcement. Every little noise was cookie city and broofs were redirected. When it was clear she wasn't committed to the broofs, we let her know that those would not work and waited for her to offer the down and look instead. And now we're here, about a snack every 5 minutes, watching ocean documentaries and very satisfied with the amount of chicken and beef nibs we had for brunch.

Would this work for every dog? No. Do I think everyone should go try it right now? Also no. But I think its important to always work on expanding your toolbox and most importantly, to understand what every tool is for.

[acedavestrider]

ooooooughhhh biting and maiming and tearing and scratching and killing and bleeding and

[moocowofdoom]

Had a job interview today !!!!!

[distracted-obsessions]

The urge to make a Whumpee based off of this coworker of mine...

[corishadowfang]

What’s the craziest thing you’ve had to look up for a fanfic? Personally i just had to pull up SPECIFICALLY the third edition of the dsm for the new chapter of my fic im working on so i got curious,

I feel like most of the stuff I've had to research for fanfic is relatively boring, haha. That said, I did do a lot of research on sailing for On the Edge of Daybreak! I remember watching videos of people talking about how to sail and pausing every few seconds to take notes, haha.

[clannfearrunt]

Entering the job future dread spiral but this time I HAVENT looked up how to become an electrician. We are doing better

[red-faced-wolf]

God I really hope I hear from this other company soon. I want to move on from residential and light commercial hvac and go to heavy commercial refrigeration. The company I want to work for got contracts to two big projects near the place I’m hoping to move to so it’ll be a sweet gig if I get it.

It will also be funny, I get the job, I take my vacation time at my current company, I come back and they’re like “here’s a van” and I go “see thanks, oh here’s my two weeks” and leave

[namira]

The volunteer document transcriptionist stuff I do is so fun and genuinely it would be my dream job if I could get paid for it.

[nekhcore]

short story: peace in paradise

prompt: Write about an unglamorous job at the galaxy’s glitziest space station. [2500 words] [science fiction]

~~

Paradise was one of the largest intergalactic rest stations in the United Spacefront, but for all its gleaming lights it may as well have been its own sun. Countless travelers from all corners of the U.S. passed through this enormous outpost every day, and at first glance every single one of them thought they’d seen heaven. Heaven surely wasn’t quite so well kept as Paradise was, though, and couldn’t possibly have as many amenities. There was no competition.

Out here there was everything you could have possibly wanted, if what you wanted was sprawling hallways outfitted with modern interior design combined with the aesthetics of an old world casino. The neon lights outside the station advertised its name for any ship that had her in its sights, and plush checkered floors welcomed all the visitors who weren’t strong enough to resist her pull. The red-black carpet didn’t cover the entire station, but it led straight into her outer rings where the money-sinks were. The first thing any starry-eyed space traveler saw when walking foolishly into Paradise’s open maw was a sea of slot machines, card dealers, and places to win big. Hook, line, and sinker.

That wasn’t all she had going for her. Paradise was also home to some of the most advanced machinery of the era. Her medical wing was equipped with the latest full-body scanners, able to pinpoint abnormalities down to the molecule. Her mechanics could diagnose any ship’s illness within minutes. Some of this galaxy’s most highly-praised artists did their greatest work sleeping in the lavish rooms of Paradise’s bowels.

None of that was what drew me in, though. I grew up on the colony planet that built her. Everyone’s father’s father’s father was conscripted as a laborer in her early days, and even after we were forgotten, we never forgot her. You either wanted to work there or you were terrified of her.

My dark-grey jumpsuit didn’t look anything like the fancy outfits of Paradise’s dealers and front-facing staff. If it wasn’t for the station’s logo machine-embroidered on my breast pocket, you’d never be able to tell that I worked here. I fitted my work hat over my messy hair as I checked the time—17:45. Cutting it a bit close. I slung my toolbag over my shoulder and left my room before I lost more time.

This was about when the station lights started to dim. Paradise worked on its own day cycle. It made the visitors more comfortable and stopped us from losing our minds when the hours and weeks blurred together. A janitor emerged from a service door and tipped her hat at me.

“Busy day today,” she said. “Big diplomatic convoy from another galaxy acting like they’ve never seen a waste bin in their life.”

“Anything interesting?”

“Man, I hope not. Boss said I’m on call if something big happens in our sector. I just want to sleep.”

She bumped her forearm against mine and hurried on to her room. I tried to remember her name, but I wasn’t close with any of my colleagues. We just didn’t understand each other.

If there was one thing Paradise took seriously, it was her image. She advertised herself as a place where magic still existed, if you looked hard enough. That meant that staff like us needed to stay unseen. An extensive network of service hallways ran through the whole station like arteries, and we were her lifeblood.

“You’re a minute late,” said my supervisor as I retrieved my work tab from its dock. “We have all the technicians on call today. You’re going to have to do maintenance checks in the other sectors.”

“Right,” I said. “Heard about the diplomats. Standard checks?”

She nodded, turning her eyes back to the monitors. All lights were green. “Make sure thermal and atmo are in order. The last thing we need is a malfunction killing an ambassador.”

“Got it.”

“And change the filters while you’re out there. I want that atmo tasting so fresh they’ll wish they never had to leave.”

My tab had finally loaded into its operating system, and a glaring notification with a list of the sectors I was in charge of that night aggressively sought my attention. I opened the message and set out.

They had me in the domestic sector, where the nicer living quarters and some of the parks were. The work was nothing unusual. Atmo pressure was normal, and we had an appropriate concentration of oxygen in the air. I collected a set of clean filters from storage. It wasn’t time for the filter change yet, but it wouldn’t hurt to do it early. These filters were installed from inside the service hallways, and I’d disassembled these covers so many times that I could do it without thinking. Thermal regulation was in order, the cool pipes were cool and the warm pipes were warm, but I tightened some screws just to be safe.

Doing ventilation maintenance wasn’t the most impressive way I imagined myself in adulthood, but my team was one of the most important ones on the entire station. If the systems that we were in control of malfunctioned, everyone in the space station would freeze to death, or asphyxiate without any breathable atmo. I hadn’t seen my family in years, but it was a worthy price to pay for the peace that I felt up here.

My ma always said that I was a miracle baby, a gift from a higher power. She was old-fashioned like that. Nobody remembered her being pregnant, but they had enough shame not to question a woman who’d lost so many before. Letting them believe she hid it was a much better story than admitting she found me bare-naked on the plains as an infant.

I checked the peephole on the service door before leaving. Average customers weren’t supposed to know the service doors existed, and there was no way to see them when closed. This hallway led to one of the parks, so I took my time. As long as nobody got close enough to see the logo on my chest they’d assume I was just another visitor, and the illusion stayed intact. The windows above the hallway gave a clear view out into space and the elevated sectors of the station. Sitting bathed in the view of all those twinkling lights and distant planets calmed my heart.

Ma never told me how she found me, but she didn’t have to. I remembered the fall. She told the story of the shooting star on the day she had me, but never told anyone that it was me. I’d climb onto the roof of our house and stare at those little lights for hours. I think we knew all along that I wasn’t like the other kids, somewhere deep inside. When they taught us about Paradise in school and I saw the holo-diorama of it I knew that she was a beast, a monster, and I had to have her. Pa didn’t want me to get my hopes up for such a prestigious post; Ma thought I couldn’t handle the ten year work contract. 

From the very first time I looked deep out into space, I knew she was wrong. The constant static in my body and the pull of the sky were gone. I was home.

The main garden was designed to look like an old historical Earth park, giving ambassadors and colony kids like me a taste of human history. A high-tech skybox in the garden changed with station time, and the setting digital sun cast warm yellow light over the trees and shaped topiaries. It was an acquired skill not to crush any of the meticulously arranged flowers under my work boots as I crossed the grass to the service door. 

Swipe your card while nobody is around, close it without a sound. Same old, same old. Atmo was pressured, but all the plants did get the filters dirty faster than usual. I made a note on my tab that we needed a restock of supplies here soon. Thermal was all in order. I took some extra time to check the recommended temperature for this section. Most of the station had to remove heat from all the machinery, but the gardens needed to stay a specific temperature so the plants didn’t overheat or die from cold. It was only a degree off, but those would add up. 

At once, a deep sense of unease came over me. I tried to remind myself that these systems don’t break that easily, but the feeling crept into my bones. I knew what machine anxiety felt like, and this was something else entirely. It felt just like those nights on the roof under the night sky, and those days were supposed to be long behind me.

The feeling left as fast as it came, but it didn’t give me any relief. I had spent my whole life, my entire career working to get here so I could feel some kind of normal. I’d buried myself in my studies, I’d picked out a trade that I thought would be useful, I’d missed out on chances to bond with my peers for this future. Was it all for nothing?

The blinking light of my tab pulled me out of my spiral. ‘Diplomats passing through the main garden,’ read the message.

There was still work to do. I had to finish checking all these systems before the diplomats settled in for the night. I didn’t have time to be sitting around and wallowing in silence.

Junior garden. Thermal: appropriate. Atmo: pressurized. Filters: replaced.

Cafeteria. Thermal: normal. Atmo: pressurized. Filters: replaced.

Diplomatic quarters. Thermal: slightly toasty. Atmo: pressurized. Filters: pristine.

As we got deeper into the night, the lights changed from a soft orange to a dark blue. My last location was the amphitheater facing a massive window out to space, where I often spent the last hours after my shift enjoying the view.

Atmo was pressurized, as usual. Thermal was set to have this room a slight bit colder than the rest of the station, to add to the effect. I replaced the dusty air filter and screwed the cover back on the air con.

I sent a message on my tab: ‘Rounds complete. On standby at the amphi. -A’

The service door in the amphitheater was hidden behind a corner. Most people sat on the benches, but I liked to stand up in front of the window and pretend that I was out there, with them. Leaving home was bittersweet because I’d wanted this so badly that I knew I’d never go back.

That feeling from before tugged at my mind again. I was drawn to it, inexplicably, just as I was drawn to the sky when I was younger. I needed to find it, whatever it was, I needed to be near it, and I needed—

That was when I saw her.

Beautiful blonde hair that fell in layered locks over tanned skin stunned me to silence. I knew her in an instant. I knew her just as surely as I knew myself. I knew her, I was so sure that I knew her, because she was me, and from the look on her face I could tell that she knew me too.

Her heels echoed against the tiled floor as she rushed over to me.

“You,” was the first word out of her mouth.

I didn’t have the nerve to speak. All I could do was look straight into her eyes, where I saw the deepest blue with specks of light that seemed to twinkle like the stars outside this window. The emblem of the U.S. Diplomatic Assembly adorned her suit jacket, and it all made sense. I wished that I’d cleaned myself up better.

She stared at me expectantly, and her lip trembled. I mustered up the courage to say, “Are you also…?”

I couldn’t bring myself to say the word. I was bathed in her very presence, like a secret song that only I could hear. Could she hear me too?

“I didn’t think—” she breathed out. “I thought I was the only one.”

“I never thought that I would find another…” This was stupid. I couldn’t say the word, no matter how much I wanted to. “Well, you know…”

“A star?” she said, and when she laughed that secret song laughed with her. I laughed too.

We stared at each other, desperately trying to process what this meant for us.

“Can I touch you?” she asked. I nodded.

A spark flew between our palms when she took my hand. I had so many thoughts running through my mind and so many questions that I wanted to ask her. Where was she from? How did she fall? Were there more of us? 

“Do you also feel it? The pull?” I asked.

Her big blue eyes watered, and she smiled even as tears started to roll down her cheeks. Her shoulders slumped, like she was letting go of a heavy burden, and she said, “I do. I feel it, too.”

“It’s quieter when you’re out here.”

“It is,” she said, and squeezed my hand. I squeezed back.

There we stood hand in hand, staring out into the vastness of space. The rightful home that we were denied when we fell. Her hand was warm, and my chest was too. I wanted to stay in that moment forever.

The loud beep of her pager broke the moment, and my tab lit up at the same time. The apologetic look in her eyes and her tight grip on my hand said everything. The diplomatic party needed her back, and Paradise needed me to keep her running. Once she left, I knew that I would never see her again. Her convoy would continue on to their permanent destination and I would still be hidden in the walls, checking filters and atmo.

“Mielle,” she said.

“Alec.” I thought if I blinked, I would wake up in bed to find that this had all been a dream.

Pulling my hand out of hers was an impossible task. Even after we managed to extricate ourselves from each other, we remained in place, neither of us able to take the first step away.

It was her, in the end. When the pager started beeping again, she turned and ran. I watched her go, then I stared at the space where she had been until I could no longer feel the silent song of her presence. My feet wouldn’t budge until I could no longer feel the heat of her hand on mine. After all trace of her was gone, I checked my tab.

As I made my way back to the service door and my hard-earned life, I felt a new, deeper peace here on Paradise. I was not alone. Space was not so vast and empty as I thought it had been all this time.

[mamabear937]

I work in property management. Today, someone called to report getting high EMF readings from their HVAC unit, and also that they'd been having trouble with the lights. The overwhelming urge to ask if they'd also experienced any cold spots or if they had any salt handy tells me maybe I should have gone into the business of hunting instead. 😂

[satellitedyke]

funny to me that i'm entirely unqualified for my current position at my job. I've got ppl asking me questions like i'm an expert when I barely know what anything means

[gaygnomegirl]

it's definitely time for me to find a new job. however I'm going to stick it out through the new year so I get full paid holiday benefits for everything + take all my vacation days for the new year in january and maybe february before I dip

[diegoshandyman]

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[thedeviljudges]

got approved for a rental house and will finally be able to move out of this god awful apartment, but the whole process makes me so angry. like moving costs alone are expensive but it’s also all of the unnecessary added fees they tack on. the concert ticket thing is the big discussion but housing application fees? convenience fees for processing a card? like anything extra they can squeeze out of you on top of too expensive rent it’s fucking insane. people can barely (not really) even afford 3x rent, and it’s getting to the point that you need three incomes just to afford one place. like this whole process has made me so angry, and i’ve been angry about it for a long time, of course. but also just looking around and seeing just how many houses are for rent, that aren’t going toward families bc these investors and venture capitalists continue to buy up houses. i genuinely want to know how any of this is going to be sustainable, even within the next three-to-five years.