Country Chatter

Finally I am getting a new shower in the upstairs bathroom! Sometimes you have to “wait” awhile for things you want, need or would like to have. But this project is long past due.  And just for the record,  you just as well plan with remodeling some unexpected inconveniences.

During the week, Gene and I went to town and purchased the shower kit.  We were ready!   Our friends, Lowell and Dwight, who have been our loyal hunters of 40 years, volunteered to do the remodeling for us. But in the midst of buying the shower, we forgot the two 1/2 inch copper cutoff values we were instructed to get to put in the hot and cold water lines to cut off the water to the upstairs. A special run to the local hardware store on Saturday morning solved problem number one.

Problem number two showed up on Saturday afternoon when we went to do the dishes. There was no hot water. The copper line they thought was hot water running to the upstairs was actually the line going into the hot water heater for the whole house. So, now we needed another cutoff valve. The local hardware had closed for the day so Linda and I volunteered to make a quick run to Lowes in Richmond for another valve. The guys showed me the installed valves and gave me a piece of copper tubing to take along just to be sure we got the right thing.

Now, men don’t understand how stressful it is to shop for something so simple! We finally asked for help and the over-enthusiastic salesman tried to over-sell us. The item he thought we needed seemed much bigger than the ones already installed and looked to be overkill for our project. After several quick calls home and Dwight talking to the salesman we paid for our purchase and headed to the car.  Problem number three.

We forgot where we parked the car! As Linda and I are searching for our lost car I am digging in my pockets for the keys. My pockets were empty!  Hummmm.  I looked in my purse-three times!  NO keys!!! Hummmmm. Problem number four!

Where-where-WHERE are my keys? Did I drop them? Did I lay them down in the store? That would not have been like me to keep the keys in hand.  Shall we go back into the store and look?  No, we will go to the car first and see if I left them in the ignition.

We found the car and we found the keys.  The keys were laying on the drivers seat in plain view but problem number five-the CAR WAS LOCKED!   Oh, no!  How did I do that????  When I got out of the car I remembered my “sample” piece of tubing in the console and went back to get it.  Apparently I laid the keys on the seat while I retrieved it.

There was no need to call the men as our spare set of keys have gotten misplaced.  Our car has an entry keypad on the door but the code is on a card in the locked car, in the locked dash-we don’t use it! Linda immediately said, “Do you have AAA?”  No I didn’t but she did!  She got on the phone and lined up our “help”.  AAA=help!  What a wonderful feeling to know help was on the way.  While we waited, we leaned against the car and  enjoyed the beautiful day.  Linda did try all her keys just in case and the key to their safe made the lock move but wouldn’t unlock it.  (She has a story to tell about the time her Subaru car key unlocked a Ford pickup truck).  She called home and let the men know “we would be a little late”.   Within 15 minutes a helpful young man with a blinking orange light drove up behind our car and emerged with rescue bag in hand.  “Hi, I’m Andrew!”  AAA. He quickly opened our door, checked our car’s registration papers (which were 2010!) and our driver’s  licenses to verify our identities.  When he looked at mine he said, “I know you,  my dad used to board our horse on your farm”.  Small world! Not only did we have help, we had familiar AAA help!!!  Isn’t God good!

Traveling home Linda found the keypad code in the dash and it is now safely in my purse.  And the men, they greeted us with those funny men-grins on their faces.  And they had a question…. they wanted to know if we learned any lessons!!!????? Lessons?  Nope, we are just two “smug” women feeling good we solved our own problems!!!