FINAL (?) DELAYS
We are schedule to move Monday. And we need to move this next week because we will be on the plane to the condo on 27 December. We expect everything will go fairly well, but we will be unpacking in the spring. We could have been in a couple of weeks ago except for a couple of unnecessary delays and unfortunate weather. Mrs. T explains:
I remember talking to Mama about building a house on the land after we retired. "Someday," she said with a smile. This has been more my dream than Dan's. He is a city person, he is a people person. I think Dan has no need to be where there are only trees and flowers and rocks. But he has kindly come along. I am like a horse who when it sees the barn wants to gallop. After all these years it is finally going to happen.
We had ordered new appliances when they were on sale in September. The salesman assured us that the store would be happy to keep our appliances until we needed them in November. And we would be able to take advantage of a rebate as well. This seemed like a good deal - until we called for them and the appliances could not be located. A couple of days and several irate phone calls later the appliances had been located and delivery was scheduled on one of the nicest dry days in November. No delivery. We never heard why and so we reschedule for a couple of days later.
The delivery guy called to say he was delivering our appliances that day. "Let me tell you how to get there," I said.
"I know, I have GPS," said the delivery person and hung up.
About an hour and a half later the delivery guy called and said "I can't find your house." Dan gave him directions. About ten minutes later the delivery guy called to say he was stuck and to ask me what to do. I called the neighbor who does lumber to get his big tractor thing to pull him out. The neighbor agreed that the delivery truck could use a different road through his property to get to our house. The delivery guy refused because he was afraid he would get stuck again.
The delivery office called and we rescheduled delivery for Monday. It rained hard on Sunday and I called and cancelled the Monday delivery so that the truck would not get stuck. On Thursday a delivery guy called to say he was bringing our appliances. "Let me tell you how to get there," I said.
"I know, I have GPS," Said the delivery person and hung up.
About an hour and a half later the delivery guy called and said "I can't find your house." Dan gave him directions. This time Dan gave him directions to the second road. A truck for the plumber had already gone down it and I knew it was OK. At this point I called the builder who was at the house telling him a delivery truck was on its way and could he look out for it. About ten minutes later the delivery guy called to say he would not go down that road because he would get stuck. I told him he would not get stuck that another truck had already used the road. Then the delivery guy told me there was not room for his truck to turn around. (Of course it was impossible to see from the top because of a bend in the road.) I assured him that there was room for him to turn. Finally the delivery guy told me he would get his truck muddy. "Yes," I said, "you probably will; are you telling me you refuse to deliver our appliances because your might get your truck muddy!" While I was having this conversation Dan was yelling at me "You tell him he had better bring our stuff and I don't care if he does get stuck!! Let me talk to him!!" I refused to relinquish the phone to my angry husband. The delivery guy changed his story and said no he would not deliver the appliances because he might get stuck. The delivery guy hung up. At this time unknown to me the builder drove up in his truck. He tried to convince the delivery guy that he would not get stuck. Then the builder asked the delivery guy to give the appliances to him so the builder could take them down to our house in his truck and install them. He would sign for them. (The builder was the person who was scheduled to sign for them anyway.) The delivery guy refused to give the builder the appliances even though he offered to sign for them because the builder's truck had no way to secure the appliances.
After a very frank and earnest phone call to the delivery supervisor we agreed that the appliances would be delivered the next day and that the driver would release them to the builder to take down the road. The next day a delivery guy called to say he was bringing our appliances. "Let me tell you how to get there," I said.
"I know, I have GPS," Said the delivery person and hung up.
About an hour and a half later the delivery guy called and said "I can't find your house." Dan gave him directions.
Meanwhile I was packing dementedly to be ready when the house was. "Take it easy," Dan said. Well of course the house was not ready on time. Don't you hate it when they are right! More delays. "You are going to make yourself sick,"
Dan said and dragged me away to various functions which only made me more frantic. A few days later a migraine did slow me up for two days. I resumed packing at a slightly slower rate.
Dan had begun to evince some interest but it mostly expressed itself in the form of giving me advice. He began to pack and sort in an orderly kind of way. After a few days Dan developed chest pain. It was not, he stated firmly, his heart. The pain got progressively worse and I got progressively more frantic. After a day and a half he agreed to see a doctor but by then it was the weekend so I took him to the emergency room. It was not, they said a heart attack. By then Dan was feeling better and wanted to go home but the doctor and I bullied him into staying. Dan was flirting with the Dr.s and nurses and I was freaking out. (My father died of heart related problems so this was especially scary to me.) My dear children came and comforted me and I began to feel better. After several tests they admitted it was not his heart and sent him home. Two days later he took stress test again with no appreciable results. The results of all this is Dan should take a baby aspirin once a day. He waltzed around saying proudly "I told you it was not my heart!" How I will ever get him to the doctor after this I do not know, the man has no sense.
I was rung out but began to pack again. Dan began also but was milking it, stopping after half an hour saying listlessly he was tired. I did not force the issue, still being very concerned. I suppose it was at about this point that the movers (who had been picked for their experience with fragile items) broke one of our glass pieces. It was an accident caused by one of our wobbly steps which I had warned them about. The moving guy was most distraught when he called me on the phone, Dan recovered amazingly and was cussing vigorously and I was trying to calm everyone down, in the middle as usual. Fortunately this was a flameworked piece so it might be fixable but I have so far been unable to get a hold of the artist to see if he will try.
We thought we had the move scheduled when it turns out that the carpet guys neglected to tell anyone that one of our carpet choices had been backordered with no real guarantee as to when it might come. We went down and picked out a different color which would be delivered two days later. They promised! After some discussion we decided to go ahead with the move and not put anything in the room that was affected. (my office).
Unfortunately, the guy who was going to fix the road, which was expected to be done by now had not gotten around to it. I had no trouble driving down to our new house but when we tried to leave I got stuck in the mud. Sigh!! We decided to put off the move once again because getting the moving truck stuck in the mud would probably be a bad idea. The road guy has promised the road will be ready by Monday. Yeah Right!! At this point Dan is seriously packing and I am mostly just sitting around. I have given up. I just don't care.
Dan and Rebecca
http://casa-de-terrible.blogspot.com/
There are some new pictures at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/9151458@N07/
We may be offline or online intermittently while we move until our IT guru gets our telecommunications up and running. The next time you hear from us very likely will be from our sunny condo.
Don't get caught with egg on your face. Play Chicktionary! Check it out!
1 comment:
Gracious! I hope you are in the new place and able to relax some, if not quite ready to look back and laugh.
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