Some like it hot - and some don't

Page 5

I'm sure this is a problem that exists everywhere in Canada, but because of my current geographical habitation, I can only speak on a local level.

Toronto is a very large and prosperous city, the largest in Canada in fact. And I've always prided myself on telling people from across Canada and around the world how metropolitan Toronto is and the fact that if you need something, anything, chances are you can find it somewhere with in the city boundaries.

Evidently, I was in error. In this city of almost three million people, it is virtually impossible to get a small air conditioner. Anywhere. I know because I worked up quite a sweat trying to locate one.

My girlfriend and I have just purchased a house and are currently renovating it. For one reason or another, the new bedroom is substantially hotter than the one we're leaving. (I wish I could take credit for that, but unfortunately I can't.) The logical conclusion was made and off I went in search of an air conditioner, one small enough to fit vertically in the only window available. About five- or six-thousand B.T.U. (whatever the hell those are) would be just about right. Anything higher would trip a breaker switch.

My first stop - Home Depot. They only had 10,000 B.T.U. machines. Same with Canadian Tire. Then I journeyed to the Toronto landmark known as Honest Ed's, the famous bargain place. The only air conditioner they had cost about $1,000. I could get a plane ticket to the Arctic for that amount of money. Eaton's doesn't carry them (or anything) anymore, and the venerable Hudson's Bay Co. had only one left in the store, and it was way too big for my needs. I was running out of alternatives, as well as clothes not soaked in sweat.

In this consumer-driven society, I am having difficulty figuring out why a simple small air conditioner is so close to extinction. About 10 years ago, I bought an air conditioner. That one was to difficult to locate because I bought it during the first heat wave of the summer, when appliance stores were flooded with patrons eager to avoid the summer heat, eager to roll around naked in cool ecstasy. That kind of appliance scarcity I could understand. But here we are, near the tail end of summer, and a good air conditioner is still difficult to locate. It doesn't make sense. There's only a few more weeks of hot weather left so there can't be that big a run on them.

Now I am quite tempted to start a company that manufactures these things because I can't be the only person out there on a mission like this. I know there's definitely a market out there. You would think the existing manufacturers of these mechanisms would plan ahead. This is Canada, a nation of people who love the cold - maybe love isn't the word - a nation of people who are conditioned (pun intended) to the cold. I personally think air conditioning, next to fire and the wheel, is one of the three greatest inventions ever created.

So now it seems I must move into our new house disheartened. Disheartened and hot, not a good combination for your first home. I know somewhere out there is a small air conditioner with my name on it. I can hear it calling my name across the sweltering landscape. Maybe I'll have to make one of those clandestine trips across the border that the provincial and federal governments discourage.

But what really gets me is the alternative reality of the situation. Believe it or not, it is probably easier in my beloved city of Toronto to get crack cocaine, kiddy porn, and probably a gun, then it is to get a small 6,000 B.T.U. air conditioner.

Welcome to Toronto.