Internal Combustion- Two Ways

It's amazing how money just flows in and out of my hands, especially on unforseen things that happen to pop up when you least expect it.

Last week, it started with my furnace. It was a Sunday evening, and I was sitting at the computer. I was checking my email, playing a game, and checking things out on facebook when I smelled something to the likes of burnt plastic, electricity, and dust. This wasn't a pleasant smell.

I couldn't tell if my house was on fire or not, as my greyhounds (being the lazy hounds they are) were snoozing away. I went downstairs, checked things out, and came to the realization that maybe my air ducts needed to be cleaned.

Well, the smell didn't go away.

I went to the basement, and everything seemed in order. I let my hounds out, as by now they were prancing around the house, thinking that it would be a splendid time to go out, even IF it was -8 degrees outside. It made me wish I had a different house that had a backyard instead of a fenced side yard that I have, as each time I have to let them out, I have to walk them to it. I wasn't happy.

The three of us came back inside, only to still smell the funny electrical plasticky smell. It also felt colder in my house. I checked the thermostat to find that instead of being a balmy 68, it was now 65. This wasn't a good sign. It was especially not good, since it was now about 1 a.m., and not having heat was an issue.
I thought I'd be resourceful and try to fix things myself, so I checked the internet to see if there was something I could do to diagnose the problem. Flipping the breaker (even though it wasn't blown) seemed to kick the furnace in again. And I got a MAJOR dose of the burnt plastic smell again. I thought I would go upstairs and just go to bed.

After lying in bed for about 10 minutes, and stewing about the fact that I was probably going to be asphyxiated by carbon monoxide (being the fatalist I can sometimes be), and worried about how my house would look if someone were to find me, I got up and called the furnace hotline where I got my furnace.

Pavlik Heating and Cooling has a 24 hour service line as I soon found out, and was greeted by a very pleasant man who, after asking a slew of questions, thought it best that I talk to the technician on call. Two minutes later, the guy called. It sounded like he had been awaken from a deep slumber, which made me feel terrible. Unlike me, he was quite pleasant to talk to after being jolted awake by the phone.

Seeing as there wasn't really a whole lot that could be done over the phone, he said he'd be willing to stop over and check the furnace right away. It was now about 1:45 a.m., and I couldn't really justify calling the poor man out, when I would be getting up in a matter of a couple of hours. So I told the guy not to worry, so long as someone came to my house right away in the morning, I said I'd throw on a couple extra blankets on the bed, and that my two hounds would probably end up sleeping with me anyhow, so I would be fine.

Well, waking up, I could just about see my breath. The thermostat was 54. I like a cold house, but 54 is just a bit much.

The technician came later that morning, to discover that my thermostat had gone bad, and that some air flow duct thing was shorted out (hence the electrical smell). $250later, I had heat, and I was happy. It certainly was better than having to have a new furnace.

Well, the next evening, I had fallen asleep on the sofa, and must have placed my new glasses on the end table. Well, waking up in the morning, my glasses went missing. Searching for them all over the house, I went upstairs to find that they were a midnight snack for my greyhound, Siri. I was only able to find about 2/3 of my glasses, with one bow missing (and I am a bit concerned since it is made out of metal). Collecting the 4 pieces of chewed plastic and broken lenses (with a nice canine tooth mark in the middle of one of the lenses), I had to call my optometrist to see if I could get them replaced with exactly the same frames and lenses (after all, I LOVED my glasses).

Low and behold, the assistant at the office must have caught me on a good day, as somehow she convinced me to purchase additional warranty coverage in case something like what I experienced happened. I was a happy guy. All I had to do was to take in the remnants of what was left of my glasses, and I would just have to pay a minimal amount.

Bringing them to the office, they looked at the pitiful pieces on the counter that were my glasses, and laughed. Replacement of the glasses cost me about $80.

The bigger concern however is: I don't know if I want to know where that metal bow is. I'm hoping I find it in the spring in the house, rather than randomly finding it with the lawnmower.

Then again, I'm hoping I don't have to shell out more cash for an unexpected vet bill.

When it rains, it pours....

PV #10

I felt like crap this morning. It must have been the champagne and the varieties of alcohol that I attempted to try, without having eaten anything. Luckily I didn't have to get up at the butt-crack of dawn this morning. I had breakfast...rather, coffee, with Cat and Janet before leaving for the airport. I managed to get there just fine, and made it through security and ticketing without any issues.

Upon arriving at the gate, someone from Mexicana Airlines had changed the status of my flight to "closed." I wasn't so sure I knew what that meant, since in any foreign country, things don't always translate to English as it should. I was certain, however, that it wasn't "cancelled," which would have been far worse. It certainly threw several passengers into a dither (mostly the non-Mexicans), and it had the possibility to end some short lived marriages (as many couples were there for their honeymoon). In particular, a German couple panicked, so much so that the man blew a gasket, and then literally ran like O.J. to the ticketing counter...on the other side of security. Well, of course he was told that he was at the correct gate, and that they had just put "closed" on the screen to alert passengers that no more people could check-in. I found this strange in that NONE of the other flights had that happen.

Anyhow, upon the German guy's re-arrival at the gate, being all red-faced and sweaty, he started yelling at his wife for making him run all over the airport "like an old mule." I badly wanted to say, "you just looked like a jackass is all."

I made it on the plane just fine, and had my complimentary drink and peanuts. Unlike the airlines in the U.S., I got more than 4. How lucky.

Connecting flights in Mexico City was interesting as well. It certainly was much easier not having to go through immigration. While my connecting flight was very close to where I got off my other flight, the process by which we boarded Mexicana 802 was anything but. Everyone needed to get hand searched, and dispose of any liquids in order to get sent through. The airline attendant did ask for people to board that were elite members, with small children, or needed special assistance, however no one seeemed to pay any attention to her. Apparently everyone but me needed special assistance.

Once on the plane to Chicago, it took forever for us to get going, only to find out (thankfully) that the plane was having mechanical issues, causing everyone to have to get off the plane and go to a different gate where we waited for a new plane to arrive. And the same process with security started ALL over again...with the same result. We ended up leaving an hour and 20 minutes late, partially due to three Mexican fartknockers from first class that decided to tour the entire Mexico City airport before boarding.

Also interesting was the round American woman clad in her best tube top and daisy dukes ranting to the gate agent about the delay, and that she had to be searched again. In that get up, I'm sure it was no thrill for the security people to check her again either.

But we made it off from Mexico City without issues, except that the cabin temperature was about 87, the woefully slow service (such as sitting with finished dinner trays in your lap for 45 minutes), and a Mexican toddler two rows behind me that screamed the whole flight to the point of hoarseness. Thank GOD I saved enough battery power on my iPod. I don't think the experience could have been worse. Then again, where was the Empress to floss her teeth when you needed her to?

I mentioned to the flight attendant that it was really hot in the cabin, to which her response was, "it's much cooler in the back of the plane," which was extremely helpful given that we were on a completely full flight. Perhaps that is the Mexican way of handling conflict, since it reminded me of two times on our trip. One instance was where Janet, Cat, and Monette daily had to call to the front desk to ask for more towels. The third day they asked, they got a resigned "we know" from the staff member.

The second instance was at our last lunch when Monette received a very "smelly" seafood sandwich. Upon going up to the hamburger guy, the waiter came up behind her and asked if her sandwich was ok? Monette, not being shy, said that it smelled funny. The guy looked at her, chuckled a little, and nodded, as if to say, "yeah, I know." What the hell?

Anyhow, I made it to O'Hare just fine, and after having my bag searched in customs, I was able to make it to the bus in time for the 9:30 departure. But, since I was the only one on the bus, I had to go all the way back to the bus terminal, and wait for another 45 minutes for more passengers. I finally made it home by about 12:30, and was grateful to spend the night in my own bed.

The thought of getting up early this morning, however, is certainly NOT attractive. I will say that my vacation with my dear friend Monette, and her awesome friends Cat and Janet, were an incredible way to spend my 40th birthday, with many things to remember.

Now it's back to the grindstone.

PV #9

The same thing happened yesterday as always, minus having dinner. It was Caribbean night at the resort, and since we had already seen two minutes of the show before hand, we decided that drinking at the bar with our favorite bartender, Antonio (who also turned 40 while we have been here), was a far better option. After all, he hands-down makes the best drinks.

Again, it was hot, humid, and the shaded area where we sat this time by the pool was a very nice change. Cat and Janet decided they wanted to play Scrabble, only to find that the set had way more vowels than normal, and included double l's, double r's, a "ch" and an "n" with the squiggly line. Yes, the Spanish version. They made do with what they had, and had an opportunity to expand their knowledge of basic Hawaiian.

We did try to go to a small Mexican tienda along the beach so that we could find sarongs for the ladies, and some for my nieces. After dinking around for about 25 minutes, having the guy take literally all of his merchandise out of his 3 black plastic trash bags (having been put away from it starting to rain-the only time during the day it rained), he insisted that we pay $25 each for the basic rectangular pieces of fabric with some machined embroidery and sequins. When we offered $40 for the four of them, he quickly snatched them out of my hands, and started folding them to put them back in his bag, saying that he couldn't just give them away.

With the amount of tourists they have seen this year, he might have been better off giving them away...

Anyhow, we started heading back to the resort when he started trying to negotiate again, at $80 for the four sarongs. Needless to say, we kept walking as he muttered some Spanish insults at us in the process.

Still in our swimming suits, we hung out at the bar with all sorts of different people at different stages of their vacations. Many of the people that we ran into were from the Midwest, including a woman who was originally from Lake Geneva, and another woman whose sister lives in the small burg of Sharon.

On the other hand, we did manage to run into some obnoxious Texans with horrible Texified Spanish accents, who kept ending all of their sentences with the duo-syllabic word "shit" (more like she-ot). Antonio asked me in Spanish what the word was they kept saying (and making him repeat like a parrot), and when I told him it was the Texas accent for the word "mierda," his face turned bright red.

That was the last time he said that again.

Finally, Monette, Cat, and I felt that it was necessary to eat (as it was now VERY late in the evening). Antonio scored us a bottle of champagne to celebrate the end of the trip, and we went up and ordered room service.

In doing so, Cat had the opportunity to use her Spanish to order it. Of course though, with the booze, it was a bit tricky, especially because the guy on the other end of the line kept asking a bunch of questions in Spanish. Finally getting stumped, Cat started laughing, only to be told by the guy, "I do speak English, you know." We laughed even harder. Even the Mexicans have sass.

We finished the champagne and much needed food, and went to bed. It was late, but we certainly enjoyed ourselves, and had a lot of laughs. Reality set in when we realized it was the last night of the vacation. Sigh!