Adventures in how to buy a washing machine

The saga of the new washing machine. The machine in the basement has been there since 1992. It had a good run, but the spinning thingy died and after paying Sears $100 to walk into my house, I was told, "ya can pay $250 to replace the transmission - transmission? really? in a washing machine? - but I'd say kill 'er now and get yourself one of them nice new front load babies! "

As usual.... *just* as you start to feel in control of the money and getting the bills paid and perhaps start thinking about the new car.... washing machines die! So I kicked the thing, reminded RJ to get her wet clothes out of it and hit the road to Sears.

Front loads. Very sexy. Especially in red. Far too expensive for what I needed these days. I am not doing laundry for a family of 4 or 5 - no hockey gear, no vast amounts of anything except for the 14 loads that RJ seems to do weekly. So I got a high efficiency HE top load energy star thing instead. Slippery sales guy told me to come back on the weekend when they would be on sale. I think about it. Do I have enough undies and clothes to last to at least another week given delivery times? Seems like a good idea to save a few dollars. So back I went on the weekend.

And guess what?

The damn machine was NOT on sale. AND it costs an extra twenty bucks to have them take away the old girl too. CHA -CHING! But probably worth it. So add that one in too.

I roll my eyes, slippery sales guy apologizes profusely and says he can't believe it's not on sale because every other piece of machinery on the floor is discounted at least $50 to $100. Yeah... no point in buying a lottery ticket that day either I figure.

Then we have the usual "we deliver between 8 AM - 6 PM and every Saturday is booked for the next 6 weeks." I have two vacation days and 30 sick days on balance. So of course I discovered I had eye disease today and couldn't see myself going into work.

It helps that A) I have been fighting a cold for about a week, so that came in handy, and B) I am in competition for a new job and need to stay home to prepare a 20 minute presentation as part of the interview process. Oh and VNN just called to ask if the machine was delivered and did I want to come over for lunch and "something?" I instead have suggested a nice walk in the sunny temperate weather today - it's 32 F and gorgeous out there! Then I will return home and get to work on the presentation, but .... I am digressing.

So... Sears delivery guy called and said, "if you want us to take away the old machine you have to make sure the hoses are unscrewed from the taps and are ready to go."

OK. AS my friend Mag Ruffman has said, "how hard can that be?"
Well. As I tried to turn the taps off - one kept squirting me, regardless of which way I turned it, and the other one, just didn't move. Great. NOW what? I did what any girl would do in my situation. I called the HH - my Hunky Handyman- and asked him for a plan B.

Oh and did I mention that RJ had left all her clothes in there? Now that was a nice not quite smelly mess.... I dumped them on the ground and figure she can deal with them. Won't be my problem. heh heh heh.

"Turn off the water to the house," HH said. I've never done that before - virgin fixer upper that I am - so I did as he suggested - and followed the cold water pipe from the hot water tank through the basement ceiling to the thingy where the gauge is for the water and there ya go! Water turned off. Hoses removed from the taps - with a tad more squirting and leakage and bob's your uncle... ready and waiting for the delivery and removal lads.

The machine is too cold to plug in and run right away, so I am going to wait a tad - get my presentation started - before attempting to attach the hose to the stand pipe and the hoses to that taps. So water is staying turned off for now. That might be part two of this saga.

In between all this, I hooked up speakers to the cheapie mini sound system I bought second hand from a guy at work. XSU took the other one, but left me all the CDs. I really need to get into the 21st century and get an ipod and dock player.

Sunday Snippets

It's been a while. I am sorta back but have been feeling a tad lethargic the last few weeks. The blast of hot weather week before last didn't help and getting back into work mode this week. Totally not helping.

Rebel Junior wants to be at school by 8 AM. Every day. This is KILLING me. Have I mentioned that I am not really a morning person? But it's good for me to work towards this goal because it will allow me to change my work day too. It's that getting to bed with the lights out earlier in the evening and not staying up to watch Craig Ferguson or Jimmy Fallon. We managed to get out of the house once at 7:45 AM and the rest of the week it was 8ish... or later.... working on this one!

I found out that a really nice guy I work with, who I haven't seen in months is at home on hibernation leave. He came home from work one day and his wife had left him. Off she went to Newfoundland - with another man- and left him at home with the five dogs and some furniture. He had no clue. Nothing. Isn't that always the way with the men? Typical. He'd been married over 35 years and was getting the retirement plan geared up. He's been off work for over 4 months now. I've sent his manager a note telling him that when next he talks to this guy, that I'd like to take a crack at him. I think his wallowing phase needs to fade out and he needs to start getting angry and dealing with the business. The five dogs and his finances in particular. Apparently she's coming back to take two of the dogs. Nice of her.

We are still dealing with our Hotelby City.com fiasco. The company very nicely took off one night's charges at their inflated price. - I am still so pissed at this thing. But in the end if they don't back away, I am going to have to pay $400 extra in hotel charges to VISA. Hotelsbycity.com is part of Priceline and I can't seen HOW they can say cheaphotels on their site and then charge these extravagent fees.

I am still working on getting a beat up old couch out of my basement. RJ called XSU to come over and destroy it and get it up and out. I had a fit (quietly) when she told me. Apparently he was going to come in the house when he brought her home after school and take care of it. While that would be all fine and dandy, I was pissed that it never occured to him to call ME and ask ME what I wanted to do. RJ keeps using the argument "well it WAS dad's house too, until you two had to break things up." I didn't even bother going there with her, and told her instead that I had things under control and really, it was okay, and thanks for offering up her dad, but I have my own friends who will help me. No doubt this would have the easy way out, but frankly, I'm not too keen to be beholden to the XSU in any way, shape or form. He wasn't helpful while we were married, why would he be now? It's that thing he needs and I don't want to be feeding his needs. I couldn't do it right while we were married, why do it now? Perhaps it's biting off my nose to spite my face ( I love this phrase) but I need to figure these things out on my own with my own people.

I called XSU and told him that if either of the girls ask him to come into MY house for any reason, he absolutely had to call me or send me an email first. There's just no reason for him to be taking requests for stuff at my house from his daughters. He, as usual, said nothing. I don't know why he doesn't get this part. It's NOT his house. He really should focus on his house instead. It's postively a relic!

IN the meantime, I've got a friend coming over with a saw, wire cutters and just in case, a chain saw to get this piece of crap furniture chopped into sections and out the door.

Not a great Sunday activity, but it has to be done!

Happy week friends.

Tool Time - How hard can it be? (thanks Mag Ruffman)

How hard can it be to use a drill if you've never used one before? It's yet another one of those things that as a separated, independent woman with no SU around, I have to educate myself.

I need to hang curtains and I need to mount the curtain rods before the curtains will hang. I've never done this before so I watched about four Youtube videos to figure out what I needed to do. Doesn't seem too difficult except for the part about using a drill. I have never used one before. Can't be too tough, can it?

I found a drill in the garage. I think it must belong to Rebel's BF. It doesn't look like anything the XSU would use. Not very heavy. Kinda girly even.

Okay. No power supply attached to it. Must be one of the cordless variety. Yep.... there's the charger right next to it.

Hmmmm nothing fits into the charger. I can't figure out how to charge the darn thing. I went to the Internet and found the Makita website and found a diagram of the drill to figure out how to get to the charger and battery. Okay..... looks like this little plate at the bottom of the drill comes off. Screw driver, I need a screw driver to unscrew the plate to get the batter out to charge it.

Yep, that works. Plate comes off, battery comes out - into the charger.

In the meantime, I went into the dining room and marked the wall next to the windows where I wanted to put the curtain rods. That was step two on most of the videos I watched. Step one was to figure out if I had studs behind the wall or just the gyprock.

I couldn't find my level. That darn thing was everywhere - whenever I didn't need it there it was in front of me, and of course, when I finally need it - coulnd't find it anywhere. Luckily, I had this teeny tiny level that I got at a conference - it's only aobut 10 cms. long but it did the job. Slowly, but I got the lines I needed.

Back to the drill. How do I get the drill bit to stay inside the drilling thingamajiggy? Doesn't snap in. There doesn't seem to be a way to pop it in. Now WHAT? Back to YouTube. Thank goodness for You Tube. I found a video that shows how to pop a drill bit in. Okay... try and turn that round part. Oh wow! It works! Cool!

Okay... drill bit in. Give it a shot.... this. baby. has. no. power. none. Figures, since it belongs to Rebel's BF. Weak. It works *just enough.* Not well, but it will get the job done. Probably just as well, as I will no doubt make a mess of the wall if I try and use some Tim-Taylor-Tool-Time-More-Power kinda drill.

It's now or never. Popped that drill into the wall. Made a hole. Popped one of those plastic anchor thingys into the wall, popped the screw back in, did it a second time and LOOK AT THAT!

It worked! Now, gotta do it all over again. BEvERage.... I *need* a BEvERage.

side remark - I now understand why men need BEvERages with their drills. Although it's probably NOT safe to drink and drill, I had to do it. Besides, it was a Bud Light - left over from the NASCAR race - barely a real BEvERage.

OKAY Round 2! One more side to put up there. Wow, did this one in half the time I did the first one. Learning curve achieved. Drill sucks. I need MORE POWER!

Ironed the curtains. Hung them up. Next window. Do it all again. I want my own drill.

In Hot Water - or not!

Rebel Junior and I arrived home last night and Rebel told me, "there's water in the basement." Looks like hot water tank is broken."
She didn't call me at work to tell me, she didn't bother trying to clean up any of the mess in the basement - her clothes lying all over the floor, nor did she think to ask her trusty BF to do something - anything!

But she's an adult she keeps telling me. Can you see me roll my eyes?

I was worried about all the crap on the floor of the basement. It's crap crap not good crap. So I wasn't overly freaked out.

I think I caught everything in good time. I called the Hunky Handyman who walked me through where the tap was to drain the tank, where to turn off the hot water and where to turn off the gas to the tank. No doubt there is a youttube video on this too.

I went and found Rebel's BF and asked him if he could tell me where the drain thingy was for the tank. He came down stairs and took over. After he went back up to Rebel and yelled at her for not telling him that there wasn't a "leak" there was a "puddle" or three... and why didn't she get him earlier to deal with things.
He went and found a shop vac and vacuumed up the water that I didn't manage to scoop up off the floor.

I got a fan going on the floor and hope my new floor isn't going to be damaged. And someone at work is going to loan me a de humidifier so I can draw out the rest of the moisture from the basement. I think I am good and won't need an insurance claim on this one.

So now the question - tankless or tank? I have to decide quickly. One company told me I could have a new tank installed IN A WEEK! They're going to try and speed things up but who knows. Service isn't really job one for any of these companies. But I will check out one or two other sources.

Pretty much immediately on hearing there was no hot water RJ went to her Father's for a shower and decided to stay there til the tank is replaced. Rebel took her over there and had a shower too.

Apparently XSU hadn't done his taxes yet. Very strange behavior since he always does them long before deadline date. He was very cranky Rebel said. She said he didn't seem to want them around. They were going to take the dog with them, and at that he put his foot down. Cranky cranky. LOL.

In the meantime, while I wait for the water tank people, I can get a few other things done around the house. Or maybe I'll just watch The View.