IceMan

For those who were alive and well in the mid 80's one of the great movies of the time was Top Gun. Naturally we think of the classic Tom Cruise performance in this movie or the esteemed Anthony Edwards as Goose. Then there was the epic portrayal of ICEMAN by none other then Val Kilmer. Yes it was epic indeed. Hate to say it but I think the ICEMAN has gone down hill a skosh as an actor. But really, it would be hard to improve on this role, you don't exactly one up the ICEMAN. Well, Nick Rivers was up there as well but I don't know if Top Secret was out before or after Top Gun. Regardless, in both movies Val Kilmer was at the top of his game and one thing is for certain, this is not Mel Torme.

If you have read this entire introductory paragraph I apologize now because other than the name ICEMAN this has absolutely nothing to do with this post. Top Gun just came to mind when I titled the post and so I blurbed a bit. Thanks for indulging however. No today I titled it ICEMAN because we have had success in hooking up, cleaning, and firing up the ice machine. Not only that but we have produced ice. The machine is working like a champ and that is fantastic. My Internet is down at the moment and I am not sure why. After rebooting the comp it remained down and I lacked the patience to try and figure it out and had no desire to type on the Blackberry tonight so I am in the store at the moment. I checked said ice machine on arrival and it is going strong. This is fantastic.

I learned a little something about how the ice machine actually works today. This one uses water to heat and cool the refrigerant as opposed to air. In doing so it pumps water through two different systems within the machine. The first, as you might guess, is the ice tray or ice producing system directly. The second is through the refrigeration or compressor side of the system. Both of these end up working together in an interesting way.

When producing ice the incoming water gets distributed appropriately so that there is plenty of cooling on the refrigeration side and also so there is water being pumped and run across the face that freezes and cubes the water. As the ice gets to where it has formed and it is ready to be broken away from the cube face something interesting happens. The water that is pumping through the refrigeration side is cut off. The water that is pumping through the face side gets pumped right out of the machine and into a floor drain. With the water no longer flowing through the refrigeration side heat is created on the face and rather then freezing the water it begins to melt the newly formed block of ice. This caused the block to breakaway and fall into the bin where it breaks up into the smaller cubes.

In order for the water to become ice the face plate has to go through some different things. It has to be cool, freezing actually, in order to have the running water become ice. When it is time to break the ice away that same face place becomes hot. Only when it performs each of it's functions properly does the ice get produced. Sometimes as a parent, as a boss, as a leader or whatever, we need to be cold. Then there are times that we need to be hot. The ice machine automatically controls the temp that the face plate achieves. It is in control even though it has to get hot for a moment.

Well the scripture from Section 121 of the Doctrine and Covenants comes to mind.
Reproving betimes with sharpness when moved upon by the Holy Ghost, and then showing forth afterwards an increase of love...

As with the ice machine producing perfect ice so it is with us. Life can be a delicate dance and we have to learn how to manage ourselves so that we can help develop ourselves and those in our stewardship.