Wednesday, July 6, 2011

My Stressful Day Cost $580


After procrastinating for almost 14 years, we finally got a towel rack in our kitchen, but oh, what an afternoon!

Being handy challenged, we always rely on Handyman Connection for our home repairs. We had a leaky toilet that we decided to replace, the basement bathroom exhaust fan needed fixed, and needed a new toilet seat for the basement toilet plus some new parts for the upstairs toilet. I also threw in the backyard bench my dad had made for us that was cracked.

After a nice morning of blogging last Wednesday, getting my stitches removed and reading with my pets, I met the handyman at Home Depot so I could pick out what we needed and waited outside by the main door for 30 minutes. Finally, he came out and said he had been waiting inside for me for 30 minutes. We were both disgusted with wasting a half hour of our time, but moved on.

That was only the beginning; it seemed one thing after another was going wrong:

1) The bench couldn’t be fixed that day because the part that hold the table up was cracked too which we didn’t notice earlier. He said he would cut a new part at home and come this Saturday to fix it. He only charged $20 for the this.

2)
New Toilet
The new toilet had a bigger base and didn’t set level, the new bolts wouldn’t fit because the drain was too low, the connecting thing (pipe?) wasn’t long enough to reach the new tank because I picked a toilet that was higher to be easier on my knees in my old age. He had to go back to the hardware store and get a longer connecting thing for the toilet.  Do you know what that's called? At least it worked.

3) The exhaust fan for the basement was a different size but he made do. When he disconnected the old one and tried connecting the new one, there was no electricity. He didn’t know what happened. All I could think of was to try resetting our outlet button that sometimes shuts off and that worked! Yea for me! While they were working on that, I decided to take my van to the corner repair shop because I needed to get the brakes fixed. I told them I’d only be gone about 15 minutes and they said “okay.”

4)
As I was walking back home, I saw our dog running out of our driveway and across the street with the handyman running after her! I was SO upset! I’m calling, “Abby come!” “Abby Come!” but she just kept running. I was so glad we live on a side street that does not get much traffic and no car was coming. Fortunately, she stopped to pee and the handyman was able to catch up to her--so much for our dog training. She was out less than five minutes—whew, but I was frazzled and made sure our cats were still inside!

5) That evening, I heard the upstairs toilet he replaced parts in making a tinkling noise and wouldn’t stop! I called the next day and he came back that evening to fix it, but said he had to buy another part that was worn out so would be back the next day. On and on it goes.

I miss you, dad! Good thing I have a repair fund! What repair projects are needed at your house?

11 comments:

Marg said...

That is all so typical of trying to get things fixed. All those things would happen to me. Hope you were able to get it all fixed eventually. Glad the cats didn't get out.Take care.

Daisy said...

That's how stuff goes here, too! Nothing is ever easy, that's what my Mommeh says. We were replacing the light fixtures in our bathrooms with prettier ones, and one of them came dented and we had to send it back. The smaller one for the other bathroom needs a bigger base to cover the huge hole in the drywall that the cords go through.

It sounds like you had an exasperating day!

Sandee said...

Yikes. What a day indeed. I hate it when things go wrong. We don't have too many issues here since our house is pretty new. We do have a clogged drain in our master shower. The repairman should show up at some point in the near future.

I think Abby was the most stressful event. It would be for me.

Have a terrific day. :)

Rebecca Mecomber said...

Home repairs are stressful, believe me, I know!

Mike Golch said...

too many amd we don't have a repair fund.

BeadedTail said...

I'm glad Abby was okay! That would have been the most stressful for me! I am a huge worry wart when people are here so always lock the pets in a room where I know they can't get out or else I'm a basket case. As for everything else, at least it's getting done but the process is very stressful. We replaced the heating element on our hot water heater last weekend so that was a much cheaper fix than replacing the whole hot water heater which we thought needed to be done. But home repairs are never ending!

Jodi said...

How frustrating!

But... it does seem like that's how things go. At least around here! We think something will take an hour, and it will take three!

Do you recommend Handyman Connection?

Sharkbytes said...

you'd be appalled at the list of things that need fixing here. plumbing is the worst. any job you start usually needs 3 days and 5 more trips to the store.

Ann in the UP said...

Oh dear, I once lived in an old house where nothing was the standard shape or size. It nearly drove us crazy.

We still live in an old house, but my Mom lived in it first so she got most things fixed before we got here. Bless you, Mom!

Lin said...

Ugh. Home repairs are seldom easy OR inexpensive. Our house was made poorly years ago and so we can only take on so many projects because the cost is always crazy.

We've sort of learned that electricity and plumbing are worth the expense to get a professional to do it. But we try to get a guy to do a side job for cash, which makes it cheaper.

I'm glad Abby is okay. I wonder who was more scared--Abby, you, or the workman!

Junk Drawer Kathy said...

Karen- Your day sounds like a movie or something. Did you ever see Tom Hanks in the Money Pit? This reminded me of that; one freak thing after another. I hope you had a glass of wine or something at the end of your odyssey. Geesh!

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