Repairs R Us.

What happened to those peaceful, quiet, serene country days?

On Monday, there was a repairman here changing out the windshield of my car.  My poor little car, who doesn't go out in the rain, who doesn't get driven over 60mph, who gets washed if it gets too much country dust on it..... a pebble or small rock got kicked up from a truck who sped past me in the left lane of a two-lane highway, and that teeny little rock hit my windshield and cracked it.  At first, it was just a star-shaped crack, but it broke my heart.  Not to mention that the sound was so loud that it scared me to death as I was driving.

My husband's car is the one that goes back and forth on the interstate, gets driven to all sorts of places during our weekly travels.......... and it's my car who gets the rock.  As we used to say up in NY: "Go figure."   The little star-shaped crack didn't stay little too long...... within 24 hours, it had spread halfway across the windshield.  I had thoughts of having to leave my car at a dealership for two weeks while they ordered the correct windshield.

Wonder of wonders....... the insurance company gave me the name of an auto glass service that comes to the house...... the windshield gets changed right in the driveway.  There is a god after all.  Not only did they do what they said they were going to do, but the man who came was clean, polite, careful, and on time.  Truly amazing.  Both myself and my car are feeling much better.

As I type, the air-conditioning guy is downstairs, putting the finishing trim on the closet doors that hide the air-conditioning and furnace unit.  He and his crew were here all day yesterday, fitting a new and larger unit into the space where the older and smaller system was. They made it work, and did a great job.  The new unit is quiet, and I'm sure more efficient than the 15-yr-old one that they took away.  Good riddance to that one, which was hanging on by a wing-nut and a prayer.

Next week, the air-conditioning crew will be back to install the new system for the upstairs.  That one is also hanging on by a wing and a prayer, with a thread attached because the outside part of that system is a 'loaner' from the a/c guy..... it's been a loaner for the past three weeks, waiting for them to have the time in their schedule to fit us in.

The work on the 3rd floor has been at a standstill now for two months.... waiting for the air-conditioning work to be completed up there before we get the carpenter back to finish the trim and the window-seats, and then the carpet store has to get here to install the carpeting.   The third floor is still just a third floor...... on the day that I start carrying my books up those stairs, then and only then will it be a library.  Bringing those books up there will be a privilege, not a chore.  I can see in my mind's eye how the shelves will look, and how I will categorize the books.

Until then, it's just more hammering, nailing, sanding.... and dust. Dust, with a capital D.