Thoughts are Things

Driving back from Home Depot yesterday afternoon, with the proper 40-Watt refrigerator light bulb — thanks to the “nicer guy” suggested by commenter Drum Major, and also replacement blinds for the bedroom window that I was assured were such a simple install that I could indeed do it myself, I had a thought …. Wouldn’t it be funny if, after I fixed the light in the refrigerator and installed the blinds, the Maintenance guys showed up.

The blinds were not the verticals I would have preferred, instead they were horizontal, but so long as I didn’t have to feed the Tyrant’s ego with a sixth follow-up on that September request for maintenance, going horizontal was a small sacrifice.

Back in my unit, I set the coffee pot going, unplugged the refrigerator, put in the new bulb, plugged the refrigerator back in, said “Let there be light” as I opened the refrigerator door and there was light.

Doing it myself felt pretty gratifying.

Hellen Reddy’s song I am woman, hear me roar, began playing in my head.

Just as I moved the box with the new blinds to the bedroom, there was a knock on the door.

It was the Head Maintenance Guy (HMG) saying, “I have a work order to fix the light in your refrigerator and measure for blinds”.

Coincidence?

I think not.

It was my favorite poet — Edna Wheeler Wilcox, who said “Thoughts are things, and their airy wings are swift as a carrier dove”.

It’s like when I sometimes think of someone I’ve not seen nor heard from in a long while, and all of a sudden that person thinks about me and calls.

Having had thoughts are things experiences more than a few times, I now make a habit of quickly saying “Erase erase erase” when someone comes to mind that I do not want to call me. LOL.

At any rate, HMG was at the door.

I explained that I’d gotten tired of waiting for my fridge and blinds to be taken care of, and was in the process of doing the work myself.

He offered an apology that, “We’re far behind on work orders”.

“You must be, inasmuch as I submitted my request in early September”, replied I, whereupon he showed me his work order dated November 3rd.

He also had a copy of the original email request for maintenance sent to the Tyrant, that I’d marked “5th Request”, along with a photo of my falling apart blinds.

If you will recall, I’d given those to Assistant Manager to pass on to the Tyrant, when we had that recertification session and she’d said she hoped the guys could get to it before the inspectors saw it. Which to me meant, the Assistant Manager was instrumental in getting a work order to the maintenance guys, NOT the Tyrant.

So anyway, HMG said I’ll have vertical blinds as soon as they come in — about a week or so. Consequently, it’s back to Home Depot, in a few days, to return the blinds I just purchased.

Now, with this latest saga of the Tyrant and I coming to a close, I do hope HMG tells the Tyrant that I was in the process of getting thing done, so the Tyrant will know this senior is done with playing the game by his rules.

As HMG was leaving, I remembered I still had all those Halloween goodies leftover from no trick or treaters. I talked him into taking it ALL. He has two boys and a little girl.

Even though the delay in my request for maintenance was not HMG’s fault, pawning off all those sweets are likely to result in his kids being hyper and crazy wired for days, possibly weeks ... what you might call Sweet Revenge.