Not A Bad Day, So Far

Last week in the mail, a flyer came for a new Car repair place just up the road on the other side of the village. My van has been overdue for an oil change for a short while and I thought, what the heck, I'll try this place out! Its convenient because its so close... I would love to support a small business rather than have to take my van to the Honda dealer in Ottawa. (Which was my original plan and I'd been putting it off, just because taking it that far is a bigger deal.. .stupid I know... but it wasn't THAT much overdue, either!)

The other attraction and I admit its stupid, is on their flyer, they had a horse logo! Guess I just proved that advertising is effective!

This morning, I called them and made an appointment for later this morning. I drove up... its only about 5 minutes away... its a small place... today, there were just 2 guys... one that owns the place and a younger guy that is likely apprenticing (I'm guessing). The owner took all my info and the van's info and then the younger guy took it in and started working on it.

The owner and I chatted for quite a long time... his wife and daughter are both into horses and have 7 or 8 on the property (He's not sure, he thinks that maybe there are more and they just get ones that look similar to fool him! haha I've heard of THAT trick before :) )

I learned more stuff about the area, horse wise, which I liked... his daughter (she's 20 ish) gives lessons to little kids on her old pony that she couldn't bear to part with after she outgrew it and does some training. He also filled me in on his hay supplier and their farrier... he couldn't remember what vet clinic they use though... apparently his wife forbids him from looking at the vet bills in order to maintain his good health.. she figures he'd fall over dead if he ever looked at them!

It turns out the horse logo on the flyer was actually taken from a picture of his daughter's horse jumping a fence and his graphic artist friend removed the rider and just did a line sketch using that photo. Kinda neat... sounds like something my husband would do :)

This place has only been open about a month now... but this guy was a service manager at GM for 20 years and a GM mechanic for about 10 years before that. I guess I wont hold THAT against him ;) We did have a short chat about Chevy Trailblazers and what pieces of crap they are (or at least the ones out the year we had one) and he didn't have anything nice to say about them.

He likes working on Hondas apparently and was not surprised to find out that we like this vehicle and that its been very dependable.

After we chatted a while, he asked if I was interested in making a deal... I asked about what? He has a few of those license plate frames with his info on it and he wondered if I would let him put one on my van, for advertising purposes... in exchange, he'd give me this oil change for free. The catch is that I have to keep it on as long as I'm happy with his services and would give him a good recommendation.

Of course, being born and bred a Hagey and therefore CHEAP (ha ha) I said sure! No particular draw back to me and if it helps him out, why not? I thought it was a really creative advertising idea and who knows how well it'll work out for him... but I was really happy with the way I was treated there today... I wasn't treated like a *girl* which is a bonus... and when I mentioned a few things that my last mechanic recommended being done he said he'd look up my maintenance schedule online and see if I'm really due for the work and that he'll call me and let me know.

According to the last mechanic, sometime soon I'm supposed to get a new timing belt and while they do that they are supposed to replace the water cooler? I dunno if those are the right words or not... but this guy still didn't treat me like an idiot and promised to look into it. Normally, I would just get this sort of thing done, but I was quoted just over $1k by the last mechanic for this work, so I'd rather be SURE I'm due before I have to shell out the big $$!

And if its time, that's fine, I'll do it.. .the consequence is if you don't do it, it can cause engine damage and be VERY costly.... something I'd like to avoid!! This is all stuff the guy this morning told me... all while NOT treating me like a dumbass!

Jess and I have taken the big step of making hair appointments at a new place here. There's a salon / spa in Kanata at Centrum that sounds very similar to the place her and I went in Kitchener. I made us appointments for Friday morning... we'll see... I'm hoping it'll work out as well as it did when we chose the place in Kitchener!!

Besides, my hair is getting to the point that any cut will be better than what I have... including shaving my head! :) And Jess is annoyed and irritated constantly by hers, as well.

We're busily reinstalling the operating system on Jess's computer today... we've been having some ongoing problems with internet connectivity that didn't get fixed by the usual means (changing ISP providers... replacing the router with an Airport Extreme)... the only constants in this battle have been my computer and her computer. We did an online virus scan of hers the other day and it did turn up one or two things... so we're hoping that a clean install will resolve the issue. We took her computer off the network for 2 days and had no connectivity issues, so it sure appears that its her machine.

Its reinstalled now and I'm just running all the windows updates... its on 45 of 63! Takes a long time... especially using just the wireless connection. So far, there's been no connectivity issues, even with the steady use, so I'm really hopeful :)

Besides, its likely good for her to head off to school with a clean install... that way it should last her the school year... and when she's done her first year, I can reinstall it again for her. Afterall, windows installs only seem to have a "life" of about 6 - 12 months... a little longer or shorter depending on what type of user you are and what you like to do and download online. Old tech support habits die hard, apparently :P

Over the weekend we got a bunch of stuff done.. .a new mirror, new TP holder and new towel holder in the bathroom / laundry room... New curtain hung in Kyle's / guest room... a couple other small things like that I can't recall right now... also got my "new" old chairs coated with polyurethane and man are they gorgeous!!

Only one fits in Kyles / Guest room as a beside table, holding a lamp and clock radio, so I have another to find a place for. We have a mirror to hang over the dresser in that room too... I just need longer toggle bolts to make it work.

We also have a small shelf unit to hang in the upstairs bathroom over the toilet that requires the longer bolts... we also have a neat metal medicine cabinet for the downstairs bathroom/laundry room (to hold a 2nd tooth brush for me!! I cant wait!!) that needs to be spray painted black and hung up.

Next weekend will be an exciting one again... my parents are coming back for a visit and they are bringing Kyle!! So everyone should be happy again :) Yay!! My parents are gonna try roughing it and staying in the guest room this time, instead of a hotel... hopefully its not too hot though, because there's no duct work in that room... so no AC. I think today I might go pick up another big commercial fan, if they still have 'em. They are the best!!

So as usual, I managed to turn a small, short update into a novel!!