Last week was crazy. It began with my iPhone 8 crashing and burning on Sunday. The systematic blow out began the week before when suddenly I could only hear when I had it on speaker. Next, I began to notice the phone wouldn’t hold a charge, this followed by Siri taking to dialing random numbers while I was talking, creating an incessant string of beeps in the background. Fearing the worst, I took it in to have a tech look at it. After examining the patient, his professional diagnosis was, “it’s toast”. This, I believe, is why these techs get paid the big bucks. Apparently the planned obsolescence had taken effect and money will needed to be paid to the phone gods to get me a new, more updated, more difficult to understand model. Yay.
On Monday I got in line for my first Covid shot. Got to tell you, it really took me down for a couple of days. Can’t remember being that tired. Getting from the couch to the bed felt like I had done the breast stroke from New York to London. Each and every muscle in my body ached, in particular those in my shoulders. Thank God for extra strength Tylenol.
Rallying mid week, my stamina caught up with me by Thursday, when I was to make a return trip to my beauty salon to have my stylist undo what she had done the week before. Normally, I am a blonde with darker blonde roots. I had asked to change this up a bit by adding more highlights. Instead, I ended up bright auburn with light blonde highlights. With my pinkish English skin tones it made me look like I’d been bobbing for French fries. Removing color, particularly red color, is a far more laborious process than putting it in. It took three trips to the shampoo bowl to restore me to my “natural” color. Though still not perfect, at least now I feel comfortable retiring the bag I’ve been wearing over my head since my previous visit. When I first entered the shop, I sensed a little attitude coming my direction from my stylist, which surprised me. Acknowledging it to myself, I decided to let it pass. The years have provided me with more than adequate armor when it comes to attitude, allowing me not to be the slightest bit intimidated by it. However, I also am not stupid. The woman was going to have her hands in my hair. Too much push back and I might end up with a mullet. Why the attitude had me confused. Her business is coloring hair. For that expertise, I dole out a lot of yankee dollars every six weeks. If it is not done correctly, it falls on her to make it right, not on me. I brought with me the original picture I’d shown her, to emphasize again how it should look. Showing the photo to her, she said that’s what she had done. Now, I didn’t like the color she had created, but I was never unpleasant or belligerent in any way. Nonetheless, I did expect the mistake to be corrected. When she told me that is what she had done, I have to admit I felt my blood pressure slightly take an uptick. Instead of losing my temper, I held the picture up to the mirror next to my reflection and said quietly, “Not a match. Not a match today, and tomorrow isn’t looking good either.” Let’s break it down. If her statement was true, than why am I wasting another morning sitting in her chair? Could it be the pandemic has left me so desperate for an outing, I fabricated a bad hair color so I could sit in a salon chair for two hours discussing the latest articles in People magazine? That’s it. She’s on to me. The attitude backed off as the morning progressed, but it had already hit it’s mark. Now I was pondering whether or not I wanted to keep my return appointment. Again, this goes back to something Rick and I emphasized with the servers in our restaurant. Even if a customer is unhappy or difficult (I’d like to think I was only the former) the goal in customer service is to have them leave satisfied. Can’t always be accomplished, but an effort should be made. There is are two “wins” in having a customer leave satisfied. One, they will likely come back, and two, they will tell their friends to frequent your establishment. One dissatisfied customer can spread a negative experience to their friends and family who, in turn, will most likely spread it around to their circle of acquaintances. In the end she did a good job fixing the color, but I’m still on the fence as to whether or not I’ll be using her services the next time I need a hairdresser.
Feeling comfortable being seen in public again, there were few places to go to be seen. When Friday rolled around it was a rainy, rather dismal sort of end to the week. To keep myself occupied, I had projects planned for most of the day. Not that I would have hesitated to go outside, I love walking in the rain. Truth be told, I thoroughly enjoy a little weather, so no complaints here. We need a lot more rain than is in the forecast. Makes me happy to see something going in the bucket. It also seemed to me complaining about a dusting of rain seemed inappropriate with residents of Texas dealing with the extreme weather in their neck if the woods. People down there without power, pipes breaking in their homes, food shortages or potable drinking water. Hard to believe in the United States of America people are having to boil water. Once again, a huge electric company fails to meet up to its customers needs. Here in California, this is not a headline we are unfamiliar with PG&E’s history of negligence and poor management. Considering what we pay for our power, and how often we are unable to avail ourselves of it, we should be far angrier than we are.
The first project I had in mind was to assemble a cabinet I had ordered for my spare room. I mentioned in my previous blog it was delivered to the wrong house. The delivery driver notified me via text including a picture of the porch with the package by the door. All good, but it wasn’t my porch. After a call to their customer service line, it finally somehow got delivered to mine. One more room in this little house would have served me well. My spare bedroom has reached it’s full capacity load. If this cabinet doesn’t fix the problem, I’m considering hanging macrame hammocks from the ceiling and using them for extra storage.
After opening the box, I neatly laid the parts out on the floor next to the instructions and the package containing the hardware. They had mixed all the screws up (screw up being all you need to extract from that statement), and there were a lot of them to sort through of similar but slightly different sizes. Someone in corporate was saving a few cents on little plastic bags the week this was shipped would be my suspicion. Remind me to drop the purchasing department a thank you note. Thankfully, each piece was accounted for according to the diagram provided by the manufacturer. As to the diagram, the kudos were less forthcoming. Hand drawn in pen and ink, it looked as though it was done at a third graders desk by the third grader seated at it. Good Lord. The artist hadn’t even bothered to use a straight edge so the lines looked like slithering snakes. Even before locating the first screw to twist in I knew as things progressed I was going to get irritated. They had placed lettered circles on each piece to so that you could match the piece to the diagram. Yup, good plan. Like it. Like it a lot. Unfortunately, the letters in between D-J were in the bottom of the box and not sticking to any of the wood. The ones with the missing letters were all square pieces and looked one very much like the other. Step 4 – Eeny, meeny, miney, mo (this step was written in Crayon). Also, some of the pieces had grooves in them and there were no grooves visible in the diagrams indicating which way they went together. Are we having fun yet? Two hours later and very much swearing released into the air, I got the top half assembled only to find out one of the pieces missing a letter was in the wrong position. Insert more swearing here. So, I disassembled the unit and threw it under a passing garbage truck. I did not, but I did think about it. Finally, I got the unit together and in spite of how annoyed I was, it looked great. Yay. I am nothing if not tenacious. Rick used to say I was the most hard headed woman he’d ever known, and I’m sure there is some truth to that statement. Once I put my mind to doing something, I am definitely going to give it my very best effort. That was me, giving myself a large pat on the back for a job well done. What? The cat’s not going to do it. I asked her, and she said no.
With Covid keeping us isolated much more than in previous years, you have to learn to buoy your own self up. There aren’t the support systems in place we had before the virus separated us. I have learned to say, sometimes right out loud, “good job, Sus”, or “hey girl, you are looking particularly fabulous and pulled together today”.
There is something so satisfying about finishing something you have started. Tightening that last screw on a swing set for an excited toddler, typing “the end” on the final page of a completed manuscript, or turning in a long agonized over college thesis. Seeing a project through to its conclusion leaves you with a feeling of accomplishment and deep personal satisfaction. I know for myself if I walk away too soon leaving something unfinished without giving it my best shot it leaves me feeling unfinished as well. My grandmother, a woman I mention often, taught me young not to bother starting something without the intention of seeing it through to the end. She was a big proponent of the old “a job well done”philosophy.
So, in spite of having depleted a large portion of my stash of emergency expletives, I stuck it out, and my new shelf looks great in my spare room. Yay. Have a special and productive day and stay safe.
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