Thursday, November 12, 2009
Fixing the ceiling
Headline of the day: "Suspicious powder on NJ Transit train in Rahway was Ultra Slim-Fast"
***
On the edge of a coastal storm, "Cloudy with a few showers. High around 50F. Winds NE at 20 to 30 mph" doesn't quite describe how bad the weather is. So I took a taxi home from the same location I'd walked back from two days ago.
***
Called my sister at 7 am to get her opinion on two options I had for dealing with a problem today. As soon as I asked, "Did I wake you up?" I realized what a dumb question it was. My sister has to do some serious partying or be on vacation to sleep that late. By 7 she's running a load of wash before she does whatever else she has planned for the day, which is why I didn't hesitate to phone her at that hour. She's also a Virgo to my Scorpio, for you astrology folks. It's an uneasy relationship but one - I recently had to concede - was not only necessary & useful, but which had been divinely appointed as a love her & you'll get even sorrier, buster matter. So I was stupid not to lean on her Virgoan big sister point-of-view when that was exactly what I did not have & she had to offer: The 7 am phone call.
Anyway, what we decided kept me home a few more hours, & as luck would have it, I was still here when two guys showed up to fix the ceiling in the other room, where a radiator leak upstairs had knocked down plasterboard, They finished by the time I did go out. I hope the quick work doesn't mean shoddy work, because I'd like to put stuff under the repair. I had desperately resorted to invoking my sister to get the repair done, I didn't know how else to pressure the man in charge of assigning the job. Personally, I like him, & he does have a lot of responsibilities.
"You know, Louie," I said to him on the phone, "my sister may have some reason to visit me sometime & she knows the kind of mess to expect from me. But if she saw that ceiling, she'd go ballistic & probably call the landlord or the city building inspector right then no matter what I said."
Louie went, "Oh?" But I could hear the concerned tone. This was a new piece of information about me, & a warning I'd delivered with some conviction in my own voice, like, maybe I don't have the temperament to deal with this but I know someone who does. You don't mess with somebody's sister. Less than a week later, after two months of forgetting about it or stalling, the ceiling is fixed.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." Thomas Jefferson
***
On the edge of a coastal storm, "Cloudy with a few showers. High around 50F. Winds NE at 20 to 30 mph" doesn't quite describe how bad the weather is. So I took a taxi home from the same location I'd walked back from two days ago.
***
Called my sister at 7 am to get her opinion on two options I had for dealing with a problem today. As soon as I asked, "Did I wake you up?" I realized what a dumb question it was. My sister has to do some serious partying or be on vacation to sleep that late. By 7 she's running a load of wash before she does whatever else she has planned for the day, which is why I didn't hesitate to phone her at that hour. She's also a Virgo to my Scorpio, for you astrology folks. It's an uneasy relationship but one - I recently had to concede - was not only necessary & useful, but which had been divinely appointed as a love her & you'll get even sorrier, buster matter. So I was stupid not to lean on her Virgoan big sister point-of-view when that was exactly what I did not have & she had to offer: The 7 am phone call.
Anyway, what we decided kept me home a few more hours, & as luck would have it, I was still here when two guys showed up to fix the ceiling in the other room, where a radiator leak upstairs had knocked down plasterboard, They finished by the time I did go out. I hope the quick work doesn't mean shoddy work, because I'd like to put stuff under the repair. I had desperately resorted to invoking my sister to get the repair done, I didn't know how else to pressure the man in charge of assigning the job. Personally, I like him, & he does have a lot of responsibilities.
"You know, Louie," I said to him on the phone, "my sister may have some reason to visit me sometime & she knows the kind of mess to expect from me. But if she saw that ceiling, she'd go ballistic & probably call the landlord or the city building inspector right then no matter what I said."
Louie went, "Oh?" But I could hear the concerned tone. This was a new piece of information about me, & a warning I'd delivered with some conviction in my own voice, like, maybe I don't have the temperament to deal with this but I know someone who does. You don't mess with somebody's sister. Less than a week later, after two months of forgetting about it or stalling, the ceiling is fixed.
Labels: Elizabeth NJ, growing up, home furnishings, Mahalo
