I love going to Chicago for the Air-Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigerating Exposition (AHR Expo). Lots of new product, but the weather is always gorgeous this time of year, even though it can be a bit balmy by Lake Michigan.

It sure seems like Dec. 31, 2009 is a long way off, especially with the ink just drying on recent New Year’s resolutions. Still, it will be here rather quickly, and with it the beginning of the somewhat ballyhooed change from HCFC to HFC refrigerants.

I just looked at the November 2008 shipment report for the industry - not too exciting. But, I noticed that year-to-date heat pumps shipments were only down 0.8 percent compared with a year ago.

Former “Saturday Night Live” satirist and comedian, Al Franken, appears to have the U.S. Senate seat wrapped up in Minnesota. Maybe. His opponent is still fighting the results of the extremely narrow margin of victory.

Occasionally, I have been known to be wrong. That has never stopped me from throwing around a few opinions, four-letter words, warnings, and prognostications. Before I launch the 2009 forecast, it is only fair to check in on a few of my past projections to find out how credible of a source I really might be.

HVAC is going Hollywood. Well almost. At least there is a boatload of HVAC videos at YouTube.com. Go online at YouTube.com and you will find a bunch of HVAC videos.

When you meet people who tell you privately that they’re trying to find themselves, it usually means they’ve tried a few options and haven’t quite decided who they want to be when they grow up. Businesses sometimes fall victim to the same gyrations: flitting left, right, then back to the middle. Allied Air Enterprises does not have that problem.

My kids like AC/DC; so did I when I was their age. One of them wears my 20-year-old sweatshirts - they’re called hoodies, now. Things that are old can be made new again. It’s the retro craze, and it even applies to HVAC.

At the Air-Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute (AHRI) 2008 Annual Meeting, Keith Coursin, who assumed the AHRI chairman post for 2009, stated that the new Obama administration might very well accelerate standards and regulations that affect the HVACR industry. In my humble opinion, this is a very realistic expectation.

At a time when both labor and management genuinely want to hold on to what they have, working together has never been more important, nor held such promise.