When I got home from work mid-day Tuesday to walk Shadow, I went to my thermostat to turn off the AC since it was an unseasonably cool 75 degrees outside. But my thermostat was off. The display wasn’t working, and try as I might, I could not figure out what the problem was. (I checked the circuit box and nothing appeared to be tripped.)
I felt fortunate with the timing – it would have SUCKED to lose AC on a typical 95 degree August day in DC. But to lose it at 75? Not bad. I called the company that installed it a year and set up a service appointment for the next day. They gave me a window of between 1-5pm.
So on Wednesday, I arrived home at 1pm and waited for the HVAC tech to arrive. It was 85 degrees out, so we were creeping into uncomfortable territory. I waited. And called to confirm my appointment. And waited. And emailed to confirm my appointment. And the technician NEVER showed up.
First thing yesterday morning I emailed the coordinator and told her that I’d been stood up. Here is her response:
Oh are you serious! Ms Farmer, I am not sure what happen, but yes we will have someone there between 10-2. Again I do apologize I will also talk to the tech and find out what happen.
I forwarded her response to Alan, who commented, “Well, now we know why the timing is off. Clearly she doesn’t understand tenses.”
I offered a counter thought. “Actually, maybe she has never learned the past tense because they never finish anything – so she only ever needs to speak in the present?”
Whatever our theories, the guy ended up showing up at 3pm – an hour past the end of his scheduled window. I couldn’t get too upset though, because he walked in, flipped my circuit breaker (which I swear was still in the on position and had not tripped), and it was fixed. I felt like an idiot for not having done that myself, but did learn a bit about how the moisture sensor works, so it wasn’t a total wash.
As I sit here and deride the nice woman’s grammar on my blog, it occurs to me: it is entirely possible that she is blogging about how a dumb customer just needed to reset her circuit breaker. Anything’s possible, right?
pithypants 
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