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Tuesday, February 27, 2007

Losing Cool

We now return to our regular topics.

Monday morning started off with a case of DDPMS. As I do most weekday mornings, I called up the stairs to make sure Daughter Dearest was moving. I heard a muffled response, and called back, “What?” She flung her door open, snarled, “I said I’m up!” and slammed the door. A few minutes later, she stormed into the kitchen and started in on me calling up the stairs instead of coming up: “people [by which she means her boyfriend] are trying to sleep!” I explained I was just trying to give her a little privacy, she snarled a justification, and I called her by her mom’s name. From her non-poker face, she looked both stung and peeved, but stuck a sock in it. Neither one of us said much on the way to school, which was fine with me. She’s showing signs of getting over herself, thankfully.

Speaking of the boyfriend, he’s starting a job at Home Despot. But unlike the lumber yard summer job I had between years of college, you don’t just start working. You have two days of orientation, some unspecified training time, tests… heck, it’s easier getting a job in hi-tech and the pay’s better. The orientation isn’t a simple matter of watching a dull video at the store you’re working at… no, they have to have this idiotic idea of “centralized orientation,” which involves driving to a Home Depot located in the middle of some of the worst suburban Atlanta rush hour traffic. To top it off, it starts at 8 a.m. and they warn you that being late means getting shut out of the orientation until they do it again next month! All this for a crappy retail job? GMAFB.

Since I used to work in that area, back before traffic got impossible, I volunteered to drive him down there. After all, I knew the back ways. We left at 6:30 and barely got there at 8 — in fact, we got there at 8:03 but they were either bluffing about the lockout or their clocks were slow. He hooked up with some people who will be working at the same store as him, and they’re carpooling tomorrow. But on the way down, I got a familiar whiff of antifreeze — which did nothing to improve my mood, seeing as the Civic has a new radiator complements of The Boy’s mishap last fall. But the car wasn’t overheating, so I got to work and reminded myself to look at it more closely at lunch.

A quick trip to Subway, and this time I saw a trickle of antifreeze running out from under the car. I popped the hood, and saw it was leaking from the same hose I tightened a while back. It was still tight, but definitely dripping. I called Mrs. Fetched and told her I’d need her to come down to pick up the boyfriend and take me to an auto parts store for a new radiator hose. Traffic was terrible on the way to Home Depot, and we were stuck in front of a Pep Boys — 10 minutes and $10 later, I had a new hose and we continued the crawl. Although it was night when we got back to the Civic, the hose was right on top and took all of two minutes to replace (it was cracked underneath). It took longer to go into the office and get some water to replace what had leaked.

One overheating problem takes care of itself after a week, the other is a simple repair involving only a screwdriver. If only all of life’s problems were that easy to fix.

6 comments:

  1. Hi FARfetched

    You need a bull horn. You could call from the comfort of the kitchen.

    I hope The Boyfriend has some good shoes. I worked at Lowes a little while after I retired. Walking all day on those concrete floors would have me so sore body wise that after being home and sitting for 10 minutes, I had a hard time getting up out of my recliner. I didn't miss the concrete floors.

    I'm glad it was so easy to fix the Honda. I'm sure I could have turned that into a 2 or 3 hour project. :)

    Hope the rest of the week goes good for you.

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  2. solar:Be thankful you didn't have to change the air filter. I did an oil change on my car and changed the air filter, it took me longer to change the air filter than it did to change the oil. The filter housing has more screws and hoses running to it than a jet engine, not to mention a couple of ridgid steel A/C lines that run right across the top of it.

    Glad to hear DD is her ol' self, and she at least knows when to stop pushing buttons.

    ReplyDelete
  3. FM, thanks for the tip about the shoes. I'll pass that on. The bullhorn isn't so great of an idea... Mrs. Fetched would hear it loud & clear.

    Solar, the previous owner replaced the air filter box with a PVC pipe. It looks crappy, and The Boy labelled it (with a Sharpie) "P.O.S." I've been thinking about replacing it with an aluminum one, but they're like $50.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Handy ... man ... :)

    I hear ya though on that orientation set-up and location.

    And yeah, ix-nay on the bullhorn. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  5. I tink you keep your cool very well with DD. I like the bull horn idea..lol. I could have used one when the boys were home. I wouldn't have care who was sleeping..lol.

    Tell the boyfriend to get the good shoes they do make a world of difference. I know I am on my feet 8 hrs a day at the store.
    Good to hear that the car was easy to fix.
    Keep the faith they do move out someday...lol.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hi ladies!

    Yeah, the bullhorn would be asking for trouble. It might have been handy when The Boy had such a hard time getting up, though.

    Dee Dee, I've passed the info along to the boyfriend and he's going to get some good shoes when he gets some $$$ coming in.

    I had a couple of factory jobs when I was in college & don't ever remember my feet bothering me at the end of the shift, but I was on the cross-country team in high school (30 years and 65 pounds ago) so my feet were pretty tough. ;-)

    ReplyDelete

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