YOU GO NORTH I'LL GO SOUTH

You learn stuff if you have been married 3 times. One of the things you learn is, it's a he'll of a lot easier to jump off a cliff than go through a damn divorce. The other thing ? Some times it's a good idea to spend the weekend 5 or 6 states apart. 
We didn't intentionally set out to do this, it just worked out that way. She had a good reason to go to Wisconsin with some friends this weekend and mom and my siblings made plans to go to Huntsville Alabama to see my aunt and cousins. 
I have missed the last several trips down here and I am looking forward to seeing them all again. 
I hope I get some time to tour Red Stone Arsenal again while I'm down there.  I was just a kid the last time I got to see that place. My uncle worked there as did Wernher von Braun
At the end of WW2 us and the Russians divvied up all the good German rocket scientists. Judging from both early space programs, they got off to a faster start but we caught up and eventually won the space race. 
Before my uncle Bob started working at Redstone he spent several years working for the Secret Service. He couldn't tell us what he did there, well I guess he could have but he would have had to kill us after. 
Uncle Bob worked his ass off to get through college after serving in the Navy during WW2. He was a door gunner in a Naval aircraft. He had an attack of bleeding ulcers and was put in the hospital, his B24 crew took off without him and crashed due to mechanical problems. The entire crew perished when the plane went down. 
This blog didn't start out thinking about the sacrifices made by all of our vets, but I'm glad it took that turn after all this is Veterans Day. 
Thank you Vets! 
Everyday!

KNOK KNOK, WHO'S THERE?

My job can be fairly mundane at times, but some of the people you meet going into strangers houses can make for an interesting encounter.
The above picture was one of those interesting encounters. It was a call on a water heater in a part of the inner city where very bad things happen. There are many boarded up houses and various entrepreneurs on street corners plying their trades.

When I called the customer to verify the call, he told me to knock loud on the door he sounded like a young guy who could hear ok, but whatever.
When I arrived and saw the sign I just had to get a picture of it. The customer was a young guy; we went to the basement to look at the water heater. He was a very polite and well-spoken guy, he introduced himself as John, he seemed a little out of place for that neighborhood.

 He was telling me about his background in computer technology and was showing off his incredible memory skills like how he uses a product key for his password and reciting back to me the serial number of the water heater. It was a fairly new unit that had some warranty left on it. I determined it had a leak and would need to be replaced; this was a 3rd party call so I called the manufacturer and gave them the info so he could get a new one. The women on the phone wanted to know he purchase date, the guy didn’t know. That's not unusual, people often forget and don't keep the receipt. Then the women needed to know where it was purchased. I looked at the guy and he gives me this Joe Biden in the headlights look.

It seems that Johnny Mnemonic can remember a string of random numbers but can remember which big box hardware store he got his water heater from less than two years ago.
It was then the guy started acting a little hinky.
He didn't seem so interested in straightening out this whole mix-up and was more interested in shutting down this whole investigation.

Then it hit me, I could tell as soon as I saw the thing it was a self install and I began to suspect the unit had been purchased at "Midnight Appliance Supply".
They don't give receipts there and they sure as hell don't do warranty exchanges.

OCCUPY HOLLYWOOD VERSION TWO

I wrote the first version of this blog over the weekend and apparently I wrote it after one too many Crown and Cokes.
When I went over it this morning I thought damn, I shouldn't drink and blog.  It sounded pretty mean and hateful so I still want to say some things but I need to tone it down a bit. I came off sounding like some of the people I was criticizing.

This whole idea of occupying Hollywood came to me after seeing Kim Kardashian on the news again and valuable minutes of my life were ticking away while the talking heads were discussing her sham marriage coming to a tragic end. I wanted to tell the Occupy Wall Street bunch to take a real stand against the abuse of power and money and fight the real enemy, the rich and famous like Kim Kardashian. While they’re at it throw in the thing they call Skookie. How about all of that bunch on her show and Lindsay Lohan ect. ect. You get the picture.
And the O. W. ers that are Jew-haters would have a field day in Hollywood.
Anyway I will leave it at that, I got out what I wanted to say and I didn't sound like a grouchy, bitter old curmudgeon.
Hmmm, now that I think about it that is what I am. Maybe I better have a couple of drinks before I decide which post I should use.

RETURN TO MAYBERRY

I had a document to file at the courthouse in Hendricks County, but I didn't want to make the hour plus drive and take the day off work, so I was going to mail it today. When I peaked at my route this morning I saw that I would be going right by the courthouse about lunchtime. Perfect! I could take the document there in person and speed up the process by a couple of days.
Danville is a bustling small town and that is not very common for small towns these days. There are a lot of thriving businesses on the square but my favorite happens to a little diner on the corner called the Mayberry Cafe. It's a beautiful day and things went so smoothly in the courthouse I decided to treat myself to lunch there.
If you liked the old Andy Griffith show the you would like this place.

There is an exact replica of the squad car in front and they have 4 TV's that play the re-runs non-stop. It's an old building fixed up very nice and decorated with memorabilia from the show. The food is great and the cute little waitress could have given Juanita a run for her money.
Something about this place just mellows me out. It's been a long time since I've had lunch here, too long.

I got to watch the end of the one where Barney bought the old junker from the sweet little old lady who turned out to be a crook. She was the same women who played Grandma Walton. Then I got to watch the entire episode where Opie falls for the little girl who won't give him the time of day. Then Opie starts hanging around Thelma Lou and the little girl gets jealous. Then Barney gets pissed because Opie is stealing Thelma Lou away so Barney starts dating the little girl. Ok I made that last part up.
I don't really have a point to make here much like most of the crap I write. I just liked the way things turns out today with the route taking me someplace I really needed to go anyway.
Make that two places I really needed to go.  

 

YOU HAD A BAD DAY

Hey Saddam you heard who's coming in today? No, who?
Kaddafi ! Are you screwin with me again Usama? No dude, for reals, he's on his way down. Quick turn on MSMBC check out the replay. Look there he is surrounded by a bunch of loonies getting his ass handed to him. Wow, look like he's crying and begging for his life!  Look Saddam, they capped his ass with his own gold pistol. Oh man that's cold.
Hey he's at the door, buzz him in.
Naa let's mess with him first, give him the old Cheech and Chong routine.
Who is it?
Muammar!
Muammar's not here.
No this is Muammar!
Muammar?
Yes damn it, it's Muammar let me in!
Muammar's not here!
Saddam is that you, you jackass? Let me in, I'm not playin, I got one badass headache.
Bahahaha ok you big cry baby, I'll buzz you in.
Come on in were just messin with you..... Oh dude! You look even worse in person than on YouTube.
They put me on YouTube? Yep! How many hits have I got so far? Well including the hits you took from the rebels I'd say about 10 mil, Bahahahah! Real funny Usama, your a regular wise ass you know that? Sorry dude but you pitched that one under-handed to me, I had to swing on it har har.
Man your head looks bad Muammar, you want an ice pack? My head? Apparently you haven’t looked in a mirror lately have you Usama? And hey, nice necktie Saddam.
At least I went down fighting.
Bahhahaha yeah right, you were fighting all right, fighting back tears! Me and Usama saw you on MSNBC crying like a little bitch!
Hey you got a lot of room to talk Saddam, I saw them pull you outta your little bunker lookin like ZZ Top
and you Osama, nice move trying to use your old lady as a human shield!
Ok ok, cool your jets dude, me and Saddam we're just breaking your balls.
Ok it's all good, so fill me in on the accommodations here, how's the action around here? When do I get my 72 virgins?  Uhh ..... virgins? I'm afraid I have some bad news Muammar. There was a little miscommunication concerning that. It was all bullshit, the mullahs made it all up, you know, a morale booster for the suicide bombers.
Damn!, well what's the deal with this place? I thought Heaven would be a lot nicer, this place looks like hell.
Yeah uh Muammar we need to talk about that, you better sit down for this one.

YOU SAY YOU WANT A REVOLUTION

Well, you know
We all want to change the world
*

You tell me that it's evolution

Well, you know
We all want to change the world
But when you talk about destruction

Don't you know that you can count me out
Don't you know it's gonna be all right
all right, all right

You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We'd all love to see the plan

Occupy Wallstreet Plan

1. Uhhh, we want more free stuff:

B. Uhhh, we want to not have to work to live:

3. Uhhh, we want the Jews to quit being bankers and stuff:

4. I mean D. Uhhh, we want to not have to pay back our loans that we are not paying back anyway:

A. Uhhhh,:

You ask me for a contribution

We're doing what we can
But when you want money
for people with minds that hate

All I can tell is brother you have to wait
Don't you know it's gonna be all right
all right, all right
Ah

ah, ah, ah, ah, ah...

You say you'll change the constitution

Well, you know
We all want to change your head

You tell me it's the institution

Well, you know
You better free you mind instead



But if you go carrying pictures of chairman Mao

Che Guevara



You ain't going to make it with anyone anyhow
Don't you know it's gonna be all right
all right, all right
all right, all right, all right

O.W.ers brainpower

                                                        ALRIGHT!

For a complete breakdown of why the O.W.ers are rioting click on this link to Pitchpulls blog. He posted a clip of the smartest person in the movement and this woman sums it all up in a "nut"shell.

THREE DAYS WITH MY BROTHER

Thursday:

Wednesday I wrote about running a route with fellow technician and brother Mike. We had a pleasant surprise of driving through a covered bridge near Bainbridge.
Today we are in my truck running my route and we are way up north instead of out west. No covered bridges in sight. I looked at the laptop and saw we were going way up to Atlanta Indiana. I called the number and got a relay service for the deaf. These are always difficult calls to run for obvious reasons made even more difficult due to the fact the relay service could not make contact with the customer.

I don't know sign and my handwriting is ridiculous so this can get complicated.
I jokingly asked Mike if he knew any sign language, he thought for a minute and held up his hand and I thought I was going to learn something, then he stuck out his middle finger. After over 40 years in the business that’s the extent of his knowledge of a second language. It cracked me up!

The day was going pretty smoothly and it looked like we might finish early then we ran into the water heater from hell.
It's a fairly new model with a heat pump mounted on top to assist in heating the water. What a great green idea huh?
One big draw back is it expels cold air when it runs, that may be a good thing in the summer but in the winter, not so much.
Nothing like taking the simplest piece of equipment in your house and turning it into the space shuttle, what could go wrong there?

When we got there expecting just a run of the mill in and out call, we were surprised with 3 big boxes pre-sent from the manufacturer. They were for a leaking evaporator repair. And I thought I was all through with refrigeration repair.

I took us over 3 hours to complete the job, not bad considering neither of us had ever laid a hand on one of these monsters before.
Glad Mike was with me, because it definitely was a two-man job.
Our short day was not to be, we didn't get home till after 7:00.

Friday:
So far so good, looks like a good day to wind down and hopefully get done early.
After the day me and Mike had on Wednesday we needed an easy route.

3:00 PM
The day is almost done, it's been a good three days doing the ride along with Mike. It's been close to 20 years since we have been allowed to do that, back when I was just starting out and he was showing me the ropes. Work has been slow lately and they started allowing techs to ride together again as a training aid.
Even though I've been doing this closing in on 20 years I can still learn a thing or two from the old guy.

3:30 PM

Driving down the interstate towards our last call and my eyelids are getting heavy. I notice my ride along tech, brother Mike has been awfully quiet for several miles.

Abhh, just as I thought.
Old service technicians never die they just fade away into their afternoon naps.