#$*($&#$()#&*$#$#(*&!!!!

So, I called Lowe's this morning.

The installation-dispatcher lady was a little snappy with me.

I said: Yesterday, you said the installer would call yesterday afternoon and he didn't call. I wanted to call in early, before he got busy, and see if there was any way he could come out today, because I can't take the whole day to just sit by the phone.

Dispatcher lady: "He has forty-eight hours to call you! It's still within the forty-eight hours!"

Interesting. The customer-service guy, when I first asked about the installation, said, and I quote: "We consider being without hot water to be an emergency, so we make an effort to have hot water heater installations done within forty-eight hours."

Not: you have to sit by the phone with your thumb up your butt for the next forty-eight hours and pray that the installer has some time for you this week.

I told her I could be available today, but not tomorrow, and Thursday and Friday in the afternoon. She made an annoyed grunt and said that he was coming in to pick up a dishwasher this morning (which means there's at least one job ahead of me) and she'd have him call me then.

Uh-huh. I wonder what time he comes in.

I'm just really peeved because it is NOT FUN to have to heat water on the stove every time you need to wash dishes. It is NOT FUN to look at your underwear drawer and wonder when you have to start rationing (because I will NOT go to a laundromat in this town...I'd be afraid of catching something having washed my clothes in those machines). It is really NOT FUN when you have a fever and chills to bathe in tepid water.

This drives me UP THE WALL. Every time, every damn time I need something done by a professional, I wait and wait and wait and when I call after waiting to say, "hey, is there some kind of an ETA on when the job might be started" they act like I've been calling them every fifteen minutes to bug them. I thought it would be better through Lowe's, them being a big chain and all and having an interest in not pissing off their customers, but I guess I was wrong.

I refuse to call up my friends and ask to use their showers or their laundry rooms. But if I have to wait more than a few days I am going to be even more unhappy than I am now. I wonder if I could, in desperation, get a motel room for one night (just so I have a real shower that's not cold) and ask Lowe's to foot the bill for it?

Part of my frustration is that when someone "needs" something from me, I drop everything to do that something...you'd think I'd get a little bit of the karma-love for that, but nooooooooooo.