It seems that every summer gets a little worse for me.
- Not the heat, the allergies! The heat also sucks, of course, but I could easily tolerate the high temps if I wasn’t always coughing and sneezing through the season.
According to the local stats, the pollen levels are stable over the last few years, but if it isn’t pollen, then what keeps getting worse every year? I called an old friend of mine to ask him for some advice, and he asked me when the last time my HVAC system had been cleaned out. I was confused because I did not know that an air conditioner needed to be cleaned out. Wasn’t that the purpose of the air filter, to keep the system clean? My friend said that even with an air filter, the ductwork and air vents in the house would get dusty and dirty, and over time that would accumulate inside your ducts. I used a screwdriver to take one of the grates off an air vent in the baseboard and looked inside. The air duct was so filthy I could write the words “WASH ME” in the dust on the sheet metal, and I knew I was going to need professional help. Cleaning a piece of sheet metal wasn’t very hard, but there was no way I could reach deep enough into the ductwork to get it all clean. I don’t know if HVAC guys have special cleaning tools, or if they use a drone to send into the tiny air ducts, but I surely could not do it myself!