My dad has done a lot for me over the past few months, as has all of my family, and I am very grateful, He has been very generous.
I guess that has gotten ol' Forked Foot (aka....the devil)'s attention, and he is now doing his best to discourage my dad's generosity.
Saturday he got the call that his four wheeler was stolen from the local Big Name four wheeler repair shop. for some reason, it was stored outside with many others, all linked together on a cable, bolted to the ground. Thankfully, they are well insured and that situation will be recified quickly, but I bet Big Name's night watchman is out of a job today.
Saturdary evening, while watching one of a slew of newly aquired movies (that $5 movie bin at Wallyworld, gets me every time) I had a hankering for some microwaved popcorn. I put the bag in the microwave, hit the 2 minute button and ZAP!! the lights went out. I went out to the garage, climbed over the assorted junk to the breaker box.
After many failed attempts to reset the breaker, I finally gave up and posted my frustration on FB.
There was lots of advice from friends as to what to check and what to do, when I got the message from Daddy that he would come see what the problem was.
It was 10pm. After removing all the plugs, switches and the flourescent light over my sink, and checking all the connections, the switch would still not reset. It was nearly midnite when we decided that maybe we should look for other solutions on Sunday, when the local big box hardware store was open.
When Daddy came back the next day, I was deep in my Sunday project.
I had been needing some shoe racks to store my mountain of shoes, that are currently in several totes in my closet room. Just someting to get them out of the floor. and arranged nicely so that I can see them and not have to spend my mornings digging through the assortment of totes.
I was at this point, when he arrived. Let me just say, there is a tiny, frustrating screw that matches each one of these pegs. Well, actually, there are two.
In my zeal, I had already ignored the directions, so I was dealing with this project at it's full 5 feet, rather than dealing with two more managable 2.5 foot secections. I am not one for really following directions, and sometimes that is my downfall. But I digress.
Our next course of investigation was the breaker switch itself. I had lived in that house 13 years and we had never had to change out a breaker switch so Daddy felt that might be the problem. A bad switch. He unwired the suspected switch and sent me off to the big box hardware store. He looks down at my project, and says to me "Do you want me to finish that while you are gone, or do you want me to cut your grass?"
I kinda hate cutting the grass, so that was the option that I chose.
I set off for the store and Daddy went around the back to get the lawnmower.
I was amazed when I returned, a mere twenty minutes later to find both the front and back yard completely mowed. Daddy was obviously bookin' it! He was putting up the mower when I pulled in.
He took my new breaker switches (which I could have found all on my own had they been marked the same way...add to list "shop for electrical components with only minor help of a man") and swapped the bad one out. Plugging a lamp into the outlet confirmed we had repaired the problem.
As Daddy was putting the outlets back in the wall, he called back to me. "I can't find my phone"
"Do you want me to call it?" I replied, dialing the number. It rang three times and went to voice mail.
"Maybe it's in my chair, back at the house" he said, tightening wire nuts before pushing the outlet back in the wall. I call my stepmother. She answered and I asked her if Daddy's phone was in his chair. No, was the reply. I walked outside why explaining my odd request.
And there, sitting under the bushes by the fence, I saw what looked like his leather phone case.
"Oh..." I said with a gasp, " I think I found it" and trotted across the yard.
Yes, I found the case, and the remains to the phone, obviously a victim of the lawn mower, strewn all about. "Oh shit" I said, my stepmother still on the other end of the phone, "the lawn mower got it"
"Well, I take it that you found it" she chuckled, "Yes ma'am I did" I replied. We bid each other farewell and I gingerly carried what I could find of it back into the house. I deposited it on the counter next to Daddy.
"Oh no!" exclaimed. "I think the lawn mower got it" I said, frowning. "Yeah, I think you are right. Oh well, I have an old flip phone I can use til I can go phone shopping" I felt really bad. Daddy was just trying to help me out and for that, he wound up loosing his phone.
No good deed...
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