Monday, August 25, 2014

Dang washer!

Sunday afternoon my clothes washer went belly-up.  Sigh.

It washed my first load (whites) per usual, and the water drained out.  After a while...I don't know how long...I heard a musical bleep-pity, bleep, bleep sound coming from my laundry room.  What the heck was that?

It was my washer.

Hmmm.

Oh, perhaps my load was 'off balance', so I opened the lid and moved the clothes around, closed the door and 'pushed the button' to restart the washer.

It sounded like it was going to work...but stopped...

I tell ya, I fooled around with that washer for a couple of hours and finally got it to advance through and complete the load.  Talk about frustration.

I knew I was going to have to call for repair service...oh, the dread.  My mind raced back to the trouble I had with Sears right before I kicked their repairman out of my house telling him in no uncertain terms I was sooooooooooooooo done with Sears they would never, ever darken my door again. What a comedy of errors. I was without a washer for a month, and in the end the repair guy who showed up was so young he had not a clue what to do with my old 1973 machine.  He said he would have to schedule an 'older guy' to come work on it.  Grrrrrrrrrrr.  That's when I threw him, his tools, and the replacement part out of the house.

I had no choice but to buy not only a new washer, but dryer as well because my old dryer was the same vintage as my washer.  Whew, I thought after spending close to a thousand bucks, I'm good for another 25 years.  Yeah, right.  Today manufacturers build things to last about seven years...guess what??????????

So, I've got a repair guy coming Saturday the 30th, between noon and three.  I've already given them my appliance name, model and serial numbers.  This should be a piece of cake, right?  However!!!!!!!!!

Here's how it's going to go.

First, my machine WILL WORK PERFECTLY!  Therefore he will not believe me, and even though I describe in great detail what went wrong, he will look at me as though I'm some kind of fruitcake.  He will shrug, tell me to call to make another appointment if it happens again.  IT WILL.  Probably as soon as he leaves and I start to do laundry.

Second, I will call back, and be told the next open appointment is at least a week out, I take it.

Third, I begin to do my 'unmentionables' by hand.

Fourth, the guy returns for a second visit...again my machine snickers and works just fine.

Fifth, (Repeat from step two.)

Sixth, repairman makes third visit, this time he actually looks at my machine thinking maybe the only way to get this crazy old woman off his back is to spend time physically looking at the works of my machine. He actually finds something, and orders the part...it will be sent to my home via USPS, FedEx or UPS, and I should call and set up an appointment as soon as the part arrives.

Seventh, the part will arrive, I will call, AND IF it is indeed it is the correct replacement part, in about a week the repair man arrive at my front door and will actually fix my machine.

Now, I would like to say this is a fictional story.  It is not.  This is exactly what happened with my old washing machine, except, the first part that arrived at my door was not the correct part, and a new part had to be reordered...they found it somewhere in Texas.  All in all it took that saga slightly more than a month to resolve.  I'm hopeful, that saga will not repeat this time around.

Am I really, really hopeful?  No.  My seven years is up...the company who build my machine is probably not even in business anymore.  There probably aren't replacement parts available...even in Texas, and the repair guy is going to be so young he will have never even heard of my machine.  And, that dear folks, is when I'm going to kick him out.


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