Farmer H scared the Not-Heaven out of me on Tuesday morning with a couple texts. Let the record show that I usually don't hear from him throughout the day. At 10:19 I heard my phone buzz.
"Are you awake"
"Yes."
"Im going to call you"
SWEET GUMMI MARY! Something that NEEDED A CALL! My heart was thumping. Had something happened to The Pony? Because only one week ago, I got that text from The Pony's phone, asking if it was okay to call me, and it turned out to be Farmer H using The Pony's phone to call me from the ER, where he had take The Pony with a sprained ankle.
Then, the call.
It was about a problem at the Beauty Shop half of the Double Hovel flip house(s). Some damage that will need fixing, increasing costs. WHEW! [That tale is on my not-so-secret blog.]
"Okay. We can deal with it. It's only money. I was afraid The Pony or you were hurt!"
"Nah. We're fine. It's just something I hate to see. I guess I have to start checking Old Buddy's work. I cain't depend on him lately. I also had a problem over at the QuickFlip house. I promised that old lady that I'd get her water hooked up under the house, and not charge her for it. Old Buddy did that for me. When I got under the house yesterday to look at it, he'd hooked up the hot water to the cold water."
[I may not be explaining this right, but somehow it got hooked up so that the pipe from the water heater doesn't run to the hot water in the bathroom. So the old lady can't get hot water in the shower. She and her grandson just moved in this weekend.]
"Anyhoo... this morning I sent Old Buddy back under the house to fix it. When he came out and I looked, it was crooked. I said, 'I told you I wanted it straight.' And Old Buddy said, 'It DID look straight, to me.' But it was a good three inches off. So I had to cut that part out to fix it. And it cost me an extra $20."
Again, I don't understand exactly what Farmer H was explaining. I guess they had to get some pipe or connectors to fix it right. Farmer H pays Old Buddy $15 cash money for his help. So it wasn't from the labor.
"I asked Old Buddy, 'Are you okay?' And he said he was having some family problems. So I sent him home at 10:00. His mind definitely ain't on his work right now."
So... not great news, but nothing devastating. Broken things can be fixed, for a price. Lives, not so much.
Thank goodness nobody's life was at stake and the water easily fixed. I guess Farmer H has to do these things himself until Buddy gets his other things worked out.
ReplyDeleteRiver,
ReplyDeleteYes. I imagine a scenario where that old lady could have gotten terribly burned, if something was hooked up wrong the opposite way! I don't know if that's possible. Farmer H said there's some adjustable kind of thing. I guess it's for our kind of shower faucet. You know, just one knob, that you turn to determine how hot you want the water. Not two knobs, like with some sinks and bathtubs.
Farmer H is definitely keeping a closer check on Old Buddy's work, to make sure he's done what Farmer H told him. Then again, we know how Farmer H explains things. So maybe it's not entirely Old Buddy's fault on everything! Some stuff he has to do, because Farmer H can't be climbing on ladders, and crawling around under houses.
The adjustable thng is called a "mixer tap", one handle and you choose which way you turn it to get either hot, cold or warm water. It's what I have in the kitchen, shower and hand basin. Only the laundry has the older style hot and cold taps.
ReplyDeleteRiver,
ReplyDeleteHeh, heh. Whatever it is, Farmer H got ours backwards in the kitchen! I have to push the lever RIGHT for hot water, and LEFT for cold. It's usually the opposite sides when you have handles, like right for the cold water tap, and left for the hot water tap. Our shower is one big round knob, so I just know if you turn it too far, it gets really hot, turn it back, and it gets colder.