A Day Worthy of Ed!

[Live_From_Little_Red]

Let me tell you about our last Thursday, a day that could be truly worthy of happening to Ed.

The start of my day should have been easy. Swap in a new hard drive on a client's machine. Thirty minutes tops. But no, I was dealing with the marquis de sade possessed machine for the vast majority of the day.

Because it took so long to swap the hard drive I had to reschedule my afternoon client to the next day. I had also intended to pick up some parts but there was no way that I could get there, so I had to put that off until the next day, which was already two hours too short.

When I finally got home I found out that our bouncy-bouncy office chair, okay it's a pneumatic chair, but I can't spell pneumatic; so anyways, the bouncy-bouncy office chair decided that it had enough of being a bouncy-bouncy office chair and that it would rather live the remainder of its days as just a really low, not so bouncy-bouncy office chair.

I head off to my evening appointment. I turn onto the client's street, only to find that I should have turned left and not right. I do an about face and head back down the street. The client's apartment building is right on the corner on the other side of the intersection. Except I can't get there. It's a one-way street at that point and I am facing the wrong way. There is no parking on the other street. I head back down the other street, intending to turn at the next street, but it too is a one way street. I have to go two streets south, one east, two north and back west to get to the client's building. I turn into the client's parking area, only to find no parking. I head back out to the street; I can only go one direction and of course because they are on the corner there is no parking, so I have to do the two streets south, one east and two north, one west detour again and this time find a parking spot before the building.

I went in expecting to replace a power supply and it was the mother board that was defective. It was decided that they would order a whole new computer and I would swap out the usable parts. So no money tonight. Not until the new machine comes in.

When I get home, we head out so that Sandy can take some water-side sunset pictures. We get to where we want to take the pictures but we need to make an emergency potty-break. We find a McDonald's and decide that it can serve double duty.

The girls took so long to eat that we have to rush to get to the water. Unfortunately we missed the golden hour and only get some so-so but potentially usable shots.

Shortly after we get home, we hear our youngest calling from the bathroom. Her stomach decided that the McDonalds hamburger that she ate was not good enough so she vomitted all over the bathroom floor. We strip her and Sandy hoses her down while I clean up the floor and start to wash her clothes.

A couple of hours after putting the girls to bed our youngest calls out again. Yup...all over the floor, her clothes and the bedding. Into the tub she goes again for bath number two. Our youngest is not feeling sick, not running a temperature and is really quite chipper, all things considering. While Sandy is doing the bathing duties I am cleaning everything up. I throw her clothes and bedding into the washing machine.

While drying her hair, Sandy and I comment to each other what a day and what else could go wrong...

...We should not have asked...

The washing machine was happily spinning when we put our youngest to bed. She asked that I read her a story to help her fall asleep. Apparantly the washing machine got jealous and wanted some attention, so it threw its load out of balance. So much so that it made this God-awful racket. We pull the bedding out, and try the washing machine again. It doesn't look or sound good. It appears that something might have sheared and the tub is out of whack...We should not have asked what else could go wrong.

So now we have wet vomit filled bedding and clothes and no way to wash them. Oh joy, what else.

It is now WAY past midnight and we check on the girls before going to bed. They both appear to be sleeping fine.

An hour or so later our youngest calls out again. We rush to the room. Nope she wasn't sick. She just couldn't fall back to sleep. We decided that she could sleep in our bed.

We are all nicely settled in, and Sandy asks our youngest please let us know if you don't feel good. Well we were kind of hoping for a verbal cue, not an immediate physical one.

Okay, so now we have to change our bedding and hose down the kid again. So, now we have two sets of bedding, two PJs and various clothes needing to be washed and no washing machine.

We settle back again, if it is possible to be fully settled. Until 5:30AM rolls around and...

...this time I was prepared with a "pukey bucket" so no bedding, clothing or kid needed to be washed.

Three hours later my alarm clock screams awake. That day, Friday, could not be as bad as the previous day.

Or could it?

Brian

 

[Raulandpinboy]

You sir had a day from heaven.

Quote "The girls took so long to eat that we have to rush to get to the water. Unfortunately we missed the golden hour and only get some so-so but potentially usable shots."

Silly man did you not read Ed's rules for men with women


Remember

Arriving at the Home Depot I’m moving at breakneck speed, Donna is doing her I’m a woman wait for me best to make me insane, finishing her soda, collecting her purse with her 2000 items all of which she will need inside the store, checking her hair, waxing her legs etc etc. Meanwhile I have already walked to the store and back to truck 23 times, but this is not just today as I know all men can testify this is an everyday thing with women, men are go go go, do do do, women just take their time when it happens it happens, unless it’s a T. J Max, or Shoes are us having a sale in that case stand back and guard the children.

As to the washing machine there is a circuit installed in all machine called the critical nerve sensor circuit, you might be familiar with this circuit its the same circuit inside copiers that waits until you need 45 copies for only the most important presentation of your life, and that’s when it decides to jam, or break down on you.

If you are lucky enough to know how to find it you can shoot it, but if not you need to cover all your bases and have two of everything this way there is no stress factor and the machine will never break, because they know there is another unit ready to take its place and you'll just take your anger out on the broken one.

The only time you are vulnerable is when you switch from one to the other, the broken one will broadcast to the non broken one that it is the only one that works right now, it in turn will get cocky on you until you either…

A. Show the non broken one a credit card (make sure it has enough funds on it they know they always know) and let it know you plan on buying a new one in the morning and it’s not a critical thing for you to have one tonight.
B. Take the old broken one and smash it to little bits in front of the new one and just say well that’s that. Leave the pieces there for a bit so the new one can get the feeling of what will happen if it decides to play games.
C. Get totally drunk that way your crisis meter will peg to the who cares stage and the machines will not be able to read you.
D. Techno fear the machines are ganging up on you take a shotgun and shoot something, this sometimes called the Elvis effect will calm everybody down including the wife and kids.

So there now take my advice and have a nice day.

Oh and on the client side the power supply versus the mother board, just look them straight in the eye, and say “so Mr. (insert client name here) did you by chance try to fix this yourself?” if they either

A. Admit guilt ask for forgiveness and throw themselves at your feet. Begging you to fix it at whatever cost as long as the wife does not find out about it.
B. Look down and stutter as they say “why no what makes you ask me that”
C. Look sternly at you get defensive and yell “heck no I hate machines”
D. Say “I didn’t but my wife or kids might have”

Then they did and they broke it so the time is double, and parts are non refundable.

 

[bsbkmacgowan]

... when Brian suggested that he, too, should have a Disboards user name.

Well, as an update...

Okay, Brian maybe should have clarified which of "the girls" was taking so long to eat dinner that night. Not me, nope. Not Bonnie, nope. Kellie... yuppers. This five-year-old kid would hands-down win a slow-eating contest with a sloth! I mean, how long does it really take to eat a hamburger happy meal anyway??? Or a single piece of pepperoni pizza??? She can hold food in her mouth for longer than it takes my saliva to break the same stuff down, even without chewing. I only hope this phase is shorter than the last time she went through it... but I digress...

The weird thing is, Brian says that I don't follow Ed's rules for men and women... I guess I never got the memo. I know, I know, it may be unnatural, but honest, he swears I'm not like that. As an example, I'd rather have a root canal than go shopping for shoes or clothes, unless that clothing happens to be something really really fun like Disney-themed clothing, or something really cool, like Hawaiian print shirts or other Jimmy Buffett-inspired attire... but I guess I digress yet again...

Maybe it's one of those things that skip a generation, like being fascinated with Barbies... I was a tom-boy growing up, and never played Barbies unless I was practically forced to. Now HotWheels... well, I have an older brother and an older sister, but HotWheels, GI-Joe and electric trains won out, big time. I swore, if I ever had daughters, that I wasn't going to force the issue either way, but I was secretly hoping I'd rather not have to deal with the whole "Pink" thing. Well, at last count, Bonnie & Kellie (who still squeal "Barbie!!!" in that ear-shattering, dog-howling decibel, whenever we venture too close to the toy aisles at Wal-Mart) have a veritable harem for their single Ken doll... I think we must easily have close to 20 Barbies (no wonder Ken has a permanent smile) and their aunt and uncle on Brian's side gave them the Barbie Band Tour bus for Christmas last year.

As to the washer, well, I think we somehow dodged the bullet this time. For whatever bizarre reason, after we took the two small loads up to the single pay washer here in our condo (at least we didn't have to drag it out to a laundromat!) our washer decided to spring back to life. Weird. I closed the lid when I went to dry the other loads, and it started to finish the interrupted cycle... spinning perfectly. So, we let it run its course, ran another load (sans clothing/suds) just to make sure it wasn't playing mind games, and it now looks like it's okay. We're still keeping our fingers crossed, however, and not taking anything for granted. (Maybe it didn't like the content-matter in the previous 2 loads... who knew that washers had feelings, too???)

However, I do like the advice, Ed! But I'll have to let Brian respond for himself, though, about the computer-related stuff.

Hmmm... does Brian having his own user name here mean I have to change my sig line???

'Nah!

Sandy (and Brian, Bonnie & Kellie, too!)

 

[GotAnyPins]

In the distillery???

Amd I am like you...I don't remember the last time I ran running and screaming to any sale...except maybe a pin sale, or something special at the Character Warehouse..and then I just drove...to far to run..

And the same for shoes, but he did remind me that I do need a couple of new pairs..Thanks Ed!!

 

[bsbkmacgowan]

I'm not sure if there are any ghosts associated with the distillery here, but as old as it is, I wouldn't be too surprised! There must have been a few accidents here and there during the 140 or so years it was operational. Add to the mix that this area was also the first settled portion of the old City of York / Toronto, and I'd have to suspect there are a few old residents still meandering about!

Not that I'm going to go looking for any, mind you!

Oh, and before I forget to add... as to the state of our "bouncy-bouncy office chair, okay it's a pneumatic chair, but Brian can't spell pneumatic" chair here at the computer... it's definitely dead, Jim. And boy, is it tough getting used to it at the lowest level! Hard, too! But I think the hardest part is trying to stand up every time... ugh. Well, we bought it at least 10 years ago, so it definitely doesn't owe us anything, but it would have been nice if it had lasted a few months longer.

C'est la vie, I guess...

Sandy (and Brian, Bonnie & Kellie, too!)