Went back to the car inspections place, and he still rejected my brakes, after they'd been checked and adjusted. I'd been put off before by his attitude, absolute assurance, arrogance, but the common wisdom is to get emissions/inspections done at a place that doesn't do repairs. The repair place questioned how he did the brake inspection, based on what they found and adjusted. Inspection Guy scoffed at the Repair Place's suggestion that the equipment needed cleaning. "I recalibrate every 4 hours!" Yeah, I'm sure. I knew I'd get no satisfaction there, no compromise, no help. I left him with the clear impression that I thought little of him or his assessment, and would be permanently taking my business elsewhere.
Decided to just drive out to Repair Place and pay for a new inspection there. Before making the critical turn, I decided it wasn't fair to disappear for a couple of hours without letting D know, so I went home first. Once home, I decided to call ahead to Repair Place. Good thing, as they couldn't do the inspection again less than 14 days after the first failure at another place. They were very kind and helpful, and made the appropriate appointment, and calmed me down as well.
Took me a while to figure out what Inspection Guy could have gotten out of the issue, other than a simple power play. Well, there is an extra fee to have the Inspection place file the paperwork and issue an immediate registration certificate, which early folks like myself tend to do ourselves. It also occurred to me that the email I got said I was not required to pass a safety inspection this year, but once failed, the corrections had to be made. All rather convoluted, but I had the strong impression he was gaming the system somehow. I don't know, of course, but something was going on.
Repair Place has been straight with me for a long time, so I'm going there. Sometimes, common wisdom is an idiot.
I planned to put up some more grass-paper, and prepped the walls accordingly. Until I realized I'd not stripped the baseboards, and didn't want to use the heat gun after the grass-paper had gone up. And, both cats were happily on the bed.
Not going to strip paint that way with them there. So, I worked on a couple of the doors on the open back porch instead. When I came back in, and looked a little harder, I decided the base boards were going to be largely invisible most of the time. So, they will be painted a less-ugly color, in time, and we'll paper when we damn well feel like it.
Second thoughts can be very useful, sometimes.
3 comments:
A short walk, a change of scenery often works wonders. I think you encountered a total 'job's worth' who will lose himself a lot of customers.
We don't have inspections like that here in Quebec, though we ought to. Of course, if we did, our 2005 Grand Caravan would likely fail.
We still haven't replaced books on the book shelves in the hope that we'll get around to painting the room whose floor was just redone. Who knows if we'll ever get to it, and in the mean time, we have boxes of books all over.
Your garden tour is fast approaching, I hope the weather works out for you.
RR,
Jobsworth, indeed.
Phil,
The weather will be sadly dry, but I suppose that makes it easier generally. Everything will get a good watering that morning, from the water saved off the roof of course.
Always another job, with attendant sub-jobs.
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