When Things Go Wrong
I recently moved about 150 miles from where I used to live; from a small town to a large city. It takes some getting used to. But that’s another story. The point is, I still have a house in the small town. That house needs some work done on before I can sell it. Thus the story begins.
First of all, I am not an early riser. To me, 1 a.m. is when I just start thinking about going to bed, so getting up at six-thirty is hard work for me. I wanted to leave before the morning rush, so when my alarm went off I was up, packed and ready to leave. I took my granddaughter to the school bus stop and headed north.
I drove the two and a half hours to the small town. Actually, I went to the next town because I was staying with a sick friend. That afternoon I took her to her appointment and dropped her back home. One of her sons was there to be with her so I went grocery shopping. This is a military community, and I learned long ago to stay out of the stores on the first and fifteenth of the month which are military pay days. Well, this was the first, but I had to go, so off I went grocery shopping. Big mistake; I didn’t know where anything was and the checkout lines were several deep with customers. I only bought a few things for supper. An hour later I got home and made dinner for my friend and her family. I guess it was okay because everything was eaten. Her youngest son said as long as it wasn’t frozen pizza or out of a can, he’d eat anything. Cute kid!
After dinner I went to the house with Bill, the man who is going to do the painting. And guess what…no electricity. By now dusk had settled in. I know there was a power outage from when Hurricane Hermine came through, so I thought the breakers were tripped. No such luck. Bill went out to check the meter and came back in all excited.
“Your meter is hanging from the house,” he said, “and the wires are capped. It’s not connected to anything. And the air conditioning condenser is all broken.” I went out to look at it. Sure enough, things were as he said. “Look at your neighbor’s house; he has all new meter and everything. Maybe he knows what’s going on.”
He did.
“Well, when the storm came through, it blew over a dead tree from my yard. It took out both sets of power lines. The electric company came out and fixed mine but we didn’t know how to get in touch with you, so they just capped the lines and temporarily set the meter back up. They wouldn’t do anything else until they could contact you. As you can see the meter fell onto the unit there.”
Yes, I could see. I wasn’t sure I wanted to see anymore.
We still had stuff to check on, so with a flashlight we went through the dark house to see what supplies we would need for the weekend. That done, we drove back to my friend’s house.
***
The next morning we were off to Lowe’s to get paint and mud for the repairs then off to the house.
One good thing, we did have water.
Bill painted the walls of three bedrooms and his son did all the baseboards.
I called the electric company; got one of those prompt answers. I pushed buttons only to be told I needed to contact the local distributor. I called the local distributor and got more prompts. What did I expect? Finally I got a message.
“Your account has been suspended. Please call a local competitor for your electric service,” the disembodied voice instructed. I guess he thought I hadn’t paid my bill. Sigh. I tried getting a real person, but no such luck.
While the bedrooms were getting painted, I went through the garage throwing stuff away so the Salvation Army could pick up the stuff that I hadn’t taken with me, or put into storage.
There’s a refrigerator in the garage that I used for sodas and leftovers that wouldn’t fit in the kitchen fridge on holidays. I forgot there was still some food in there. Think, summer weather, temperatures in the 90’s or 100’s, closed space…you don’t even want to know, but I’ll tell you anyway. I opened the freezer section and was greeted by what I thought was mold. That is until it started to swarm. Gnats, I think. Well, they could just stay in there, I thought as I slammed the door closed. Did I want to check the refrigerator part? No, but I needed too. It looked just like the freezer. Well, that was going to the curb to be picked up by the trash people. Ewww, I get the heebie-jeebies just thinking about it.
Bill finished painting and we went back to my friend’s house. Both of my daughters were there. That was the best part of the weekend. I got to see my grandson and granddaughter whom I don’t see very often.
I fell asleep watching TV, but I sleep on her sofa anyway, so it was okay. I was awakened at three a.m. by a loud knock at the door. I thought that maybe one of her kids locked himself out, but no, it was the cops. It was a mistake, and the situation was cleared up without too much ado and everyone went back to bed.
Sunday, it’s back to my house. Bill finishes the painting and my daughter, her friend and I continue boxing up stuff for the Salvation Army and throwing away more junk. Lots of lifting, moving, bending, stooping; all good exercise, but a whole day of it is a bit much for these old bones.
I was asleep by ten again that night.
Monday, up early and on the phone with my neighbor’s rental agent then the electric company. I finally got a real person to talk to. To sum it up, since they couldn’t get hold of me and they were out there once already, they wouldn’t come out again. I have to call an electrician to do the repair work then let them know so they could restart my power.
Luckily, the electrician I called was already in town and would be at the house in a half hour, did his inspection and said he’d call me with the estimate. Okay, not as bad as I thought it would be, but I had to check with the building code people about the smoke alarms. Yes, new state law that any new electric work has to include smoke alarms in each bedroom and the hall outside the bedrooms, to be hard wired into the house electrical system. That’s an extra $400 dollars onto the estimate.
Called my insurance company and got their information. ACK! At least my deductible isn’t very much. Maybe my neighbor’s insurance will pay it. That’s for another day. Don’t thing I could handle another phone call.
One other bit of business I had to take care of. The last time I was up there, I got a speeding ticket. Now, I’ve been driving for well over forty years and, except for my inspection being outdated one time, this is the only ticket I’ve ever gotten. Had to go to the courthouse to pay the court cost ($112) and get information to take a driver safety course ($25) to get the ticket off my record.
I felt bad because I was going to take my friend for her treatment that afternoon, but was stuck in the courthouse. Her son was able to take her, so that was okay. I got back to her house in time to fix supper again. Once everyone was fed and dishes done, I decided to come back home. I couldn’t do anything else that couldn’t be done with phone calls from the city, so off I went.
It was a dark two and a half hour drive back, but I made it in one piece. My car is still full of stuff that needs to be brought in, but I haven’t the energy. My pillow and favorite quilt are staying in the car as I have to be back up there next week for the Salvation Army to pick up all the stuff we boxed up on Sunday.
Let’s just hope there’s no more surprises in store.
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