or…
The one where the neighbors get their first impression.
Which is also the one where we get our first washing machine (ever) and the one where I try out my oven for the first time.
It goes like this.
I stayed home tonight while the boys went out. I was thinking I’d get a little down time, make a few phone calls, perhaps get some writing done…
After popping up way to many new tabs of recently-pinned items from pinterest, I decided to take a time out from that and bake something. After all, we do have our first guest with us this week, and even though the majority of our belongings still aren’t here (including our dishes), I figured I had enough of this and that around to McGyver out a batch of muffins.
To really appreciate this effort, you should to know that I currently have about eight square feet of counter space. That’s square feet. And once you account for the space taken up by the fruit basket, the kettle, the carafe, and the utensil caddy, we’re down to four or five.
So I’m all aproned up, grating carrots and apples and chopping nuts (you’re impressed, right, that I’m doing this without putting anything on the floor?)… and my phone rings. I quickly rinse my hands, drying them on my apron as I run down the hall toward the sound of the phone.
Me: Hello?
Him: Hello?
Me: Yes?
Him: Hello?
Me: Hello?
Him: Ummmmm… LG? Washer?
Me: LG Washer, yes… (Cue International English. Around here it’s kind of learn-it-or-die.)
Him: Uh, okay, stadium?
Me: You’re at the stadium?
Him: Yes, stadium. Come.
Me: Oh no! Can’t come. No car.
Him: Please come, stadium.
Me: No come. No car.
Him: No car?
Me: No car.
Him: Uhhhhhhh…
Me: I am at same street as stadium. Same street. I go outside. You come.
Him: Ummmmm….
(And after a few rounds of huh? Huh? Huh?…)
Him: No Hindi?
Oh my dear friend. We’ve been on the phone for a while now. If I had that card in my back pocket don’t you think I would have played it by now?
And here I break from the dialog to spare you a hundred more lines of the same. The SAME! Occasionally I tried to be more specific, but the varying word usage inevitably led to severe miscommunication and I kept to my “No car. No come.” And “I am outside. You see me.” mantras.
Of course, these were salted with things that in my world might actually be used for navigation, like street names for instance, or names of round abouts… but, no dice. It was then that I realized our little street is woefully without landmarks. Um, what,” look for the dirt lot?” Like there aren’t a bazillion of those. Or, describe my house? “It’s the cement one on the right. The white one… ”
Oh wait.
So my next half hour was spent repeating the name of the roundabout in front of our house, while I stood on the lit perimeter of said roundabout basically turning in circles in an attempt to not miss the truck (besides the roundabout, there was also a road running behind me I had to check as well).
I wouldn’t be surprised at all if B gets asked at work on Saturday (our Monday) if it was his wife pirouetting about like a pre-school dance recital in the round-about Thursday night. And I’m pretty sure I’ve officially made an impression on the neighbors. It’s helpful that I now look at it this way, “either they’ll get over it, or they won’t.”
Finally, I see the LG van cruise through the round-about. I’m at the round-about, on the phone, there are three of them in the cab, and they totally miss me. Go in the complete opposite direction, actually. And then, after returning to the round-about, me still standing out there, three of them still in the cab, they turn a different direction away from me again. (At this point I could hear them laughing, which was kind of funny.) Five minutes later, back they come, and now I have to run – yes, like run – in order to show them where to go. (If you ever see the intersections near our house, you’ll know why I couldn’t leave them to wonder.)
But now we were on our way, me quickly closing doors of rooms and moving stuff out of their way… when I turn around to see – I am not even lying – a man skinnier than me carrying a sixty kilo washing machine on his back. On. His. Back. And I’m pretty sure he carried it up the stairs that way. I’ve never seen such a thing. Rice sacks on heads is one thing. A bail of lettuce larger than the woman whose head it was perched on, I’ve seen. But this took the cake.
Anyway. They hooked it up, and after a brief game of charades, I signed the paper and off they went.
And me back to my baking.
Which brings me all the way back around to the title of this post.
You see, when we bought the machine, we were told it would be delivered on Saturday. And we gave them our address. And we purchased a major brand from a major store. Which led me to believe that a) it would be delivered on Saturday, and b) that they would use our address for something.
But no. It’s never what you think. Or what they say.
