Small Talk With Big Payoff

It's always a struggle for me to make small talk with the people at work that are not members of the English department, but Friday I had a great success: there is a janitor that passes by most days while I am on hall duty, and it was especially hot and humid that morning and so when I saw him, instead of offering my usual lame greeting (What's happening?) I stopped him and asked him, very kindly, if he could turn on the air-conditioning, because the weather was so hot and sticky . . . but, of course, as we both well knew, the high school doesn't have air-conditioning in the hallways and classrooms, and so he got a real kick out of that and pretended to "clap on" the A/C, a dated but perfect joke for the situation, and this made us both so happy that I am going to work hard to think of other one-liners to offer people around the building, so if anyone has a good idea, send it my way.