is working again after a series of increasingly catastrophic minor glitches with Windows Vista, and a complete re-installation of the OS, but there are still plenty of bugs to work out - you know, like getting the computer to remember the wireless connection at the house, navigating Vista's labyrinthine menus, and convincing the OS to play nice with the anti-virus software. We'll see how thing go today. Shel's mom is helping us fine-tune settings, and I have hoes that it will run smoothly soon. The irony here is that when I bought the computer, I had it shipped directly to me, paying Washington State sales tax, and installed the software, arranged settings, and basically broke it in - all to avoid forcing Shel to do exactly what she's doing right now.
My Computer:
I have hopes that my computer will work again soon, too. Keep your fingers crossed for me. I took the beast to a computer repair shop in the university district whose staff were able to retrieve my data and put it on an external hard drive. I called Dell back and ran through the same rigmarole I had already run through before taking the computer in to the shop, and Dell's tech support finally decided to send me a new hard drive with the OS already installed. It is supposed to arrive in two business days, counting from Sunday. As I said, keep your fingers crossed.
Les Schwab Debacle (long):
With finances as tight as they were while I wasn't working, I have put off have the brakes on my car looked at for some time. When I took my computer to the repair shop, I parked on a hill, with my wheels turned in toward the curb and couldn't help but notice that my front tires where balding badly, so while I sat waiting for my data recovery, I took the car to Les Schwab to have the tires replaced and the brakes repaired. I arrived early on a Saturday morning, expecting to wait all day and take my car home that night. I even brought a book to read. Les Schwab offered to take me back to the house and pick me up that night. At about 5, I get the call: "We're only half-done. can we keep your car and finish on Monday?" (All Les Schwabs are closed on Sunday.)
Me: "No. I need my car to get to work."
Les Schwab: "Where do you work? Maybe we can drive you."
M: "Westlake." (about 45 minutes to an hour away from this particular shop)
LS: "Oh. Well, can you find a ride to work?"
M: "No, my friends are out of town. I'm just visiting. I need my car to get to work."
LS: "Oh. Okay, we'll stay and finish it, but we may not be done until 8 or 8:30."
M: "Okay. Give me a call when you're done." So, half an hour later, I get another call:
LS: "Sir, I'm sorry. We're not going to be able to finish tonight. We need to keep your car on Monday. Is there any way you can get a ride to work?"
M: (never mind that this we'll leave me stranded at the house all weekend, unable to run my other errands, like grocery shopping)"I don't know. Let me call my friends and see if they can come back from out-of-state early. I'll see what I can do and call you back." (granted, I knew that I wasn't going to ask them to come back early - they were planning to come back late Sunday night - but if they agreed, they were going to have to turn around after four days and 1500 miles of driving and get up early to run me into town."
LS: "Thank you, sir." Well, I called my friend, and, unsurprisingly, she agreed to help me out, whereupon I offered profuse thanks and promised a bribe of coffee (the standard currency throughout the greater Seattle area.)
M: "My friend has agreed to drive me to work on Monday, but I'll need you to come get me from work."
LS: "Thank you, sir. When you're off work, just call a cab and we'll pay for it when you get here."
My friends call back again and I learn that there are other plans for Monday and she may or may not be able to drive me. Fuck! Now, I'm irked. Now, Les Schwab has put me out, hosed my weekend, fucked up my friends' plans, and quite possibly screwed me out of a day of work.
Another call from my friends (late Sunday) and I learn that she will have to rearrange herday, but she will be able to drive me. I take the cab to Les Schwab, tip the cabbie, explain that somewone will be out to pay him, walk in and immediately let the first available employee there know that there is a cab outside waiting for payment. She calls for a manager who eventually comes in and deals with another customer's complaint. Some employee's mill around for a bit, attending to their duties, and a receptionist eventually comes to help me, bill in hand. I explain to her that before I resolve my bill, I'd like to talk to management. She calls in a manager, whom I tell about the still-waiting taxi. He rushes out and attends to the driver, pulling money out of the till to cover the fare. When he returns, I explain the situation and express both my disatisfation and my embarrassment at being told by my friend "Never go to Les Schwab! it's not like it is in California. Next time, come to me and I'll steer you right, but everybody here knows - you can't trust Les Schwab here." eventually, I walk out with a paltry 10% discount on parts. Perhaps I ought not to have accepted this. Maybe I should have pushed for more, but the fact is, they had me over the barrell and I can't afford not to take any discount I can get at this point.
Fine. Lesson learned - never go to Les Schwab again. I take my car and leave, still pissed, but resigned.
The next morning, as I'm leaving for work, I notice something about my car that I hadn't noted before: my hub caps are gone. Les Schwab stole my hub caps! This is the icing on the cake, but between computers failing left and right, job hunting, work, house-hunting and the myriad other concerns, I just never took the time to call them, so I will do that when I'm done blogging and let you know how it goes.
Job Hunting:
Friday is to be my last day with the TV station where I've been filling in for almost two months. I have an interview scheduled this afternoon with another staffing firm and I have applications in with several firms, most recently, with a major insurance underwriter. I'll apply with a well-known internet content provider later today or tomorrow and with a big aerospace firm today.
House Hunting:
Shel and I now have our own Realtor and our own mortgage broker. I'm scheduled to meet with the mortgage broker tomorrow, but I need to get some paperwork together, so I'll likely reschedule that meeting. After she and I jump through some hoops, Shel and I will, hopefully, be pre-approved for a home loan and I can begin touring the countryside with our Realtor.
The field I hope to soon be entering, corporate training, should be substantially more lucrative and immeasurably more interesting than the one in which I currently find myself, so I'll likely have to update our loan pre-approval soon, but getting started on the home-buying process feels good - like progress. I am ready to have my wife back, my dogs back, and my life back.
Long-Suffering Hosts:
I'm sure my hosts are ready to have their house back, too. I've been in their guest room (or on their couch) for two months now - and while these are very dear and very close friends with whom I have a lot of history, I'm all too aware of the fact that anyone can wear out his welcome after a while. They have other guests (you know, like "guest"-guests, rather than extended-stay-with-his-own-daily-grind-guest) to attend to; their oldest has been sick for a couple of days, at least; they have a still-nascent start-up business to attend to - in short, they have a life of their own as well, and I will undoubtedly make a better friend when I am a fellow home-owner than I can be as an adult dependent.
Turn of Phrase:
Finally, I promised you a turn of phrase. I was combing through various online news sources this morning and happened upon a wonderfully, visually evocative metaphor. If I don't share it here, with you, I'll forget it.
"…why force buyers to swallow the entire buffet in one sitting?" - Matt Peckham, Tuesday, July 8, 2008
