The Handyman

Since we've moved in, we've had several service workers through our new home.

For peace of mind, as our home had been unoccupied for over a year, the gas man came in and checked all of the pilots.

The next day the cable guy came and was here for a very long time setting up our cable, so we could get television, phone, and Internet.

Three days later, when we had time to turn on the television, we discovered that the cable for television didn't work, although we had Internet and phone, so another repairman came out to fix it.

In between that, the Sears guys delivered and hooked up our washer and dryer. I was concerned about his qualifications for hooking up the gas dryer, but he assured me that despite of what I had heard, I didn't need to call the gas company out again because he knew what to do, and he had even tested the connection. (So far nothing has blown up.)

When we had looked at the house, we did not see much evidence of pests, except for 3 cockroaches that had died, dried up, and disintegrated. What a relief! Once we moved in, I guess having the doors open or turning on the lights, invited a bunch of little pests. An army! Spiders don't bother me much, unless they are black widow or brown recluse, but cockroaches and those little jumpy things (crickets?) that invaded had to GO! So, then we had to call an exterminator, who for this time, sprayed inside and outside.

We have a home warranty that required the company to come inspect the thoroughly inspect the house, and that happened tonight.

That inspector informed us that it looks like the furnaces and air conditioners have never been serviced (not a real crisis since the house is only 4 years old, and it has been empty for part of those years), and for our own safety we should have a heating and air person come out before we use the furnace to clean things up and check out the weird noise its making.

How many service people are we up to now? Six. Seven when the heating guy comes.

No, make that eight because a repairman is coming on Sunday to fix the hot water in the master bath. The house inspector from a few months back when we were still in the process of buying the house informed us about this Moen filter thing, but after a few trips to Home Depot (Gawd! I miss trips to Barnes and Noble instead!) and none of the right tools to even break into the thing, my sweetie called in a well-recommended handyman who knows exactly what we're talking about.

Okay...but here's the kicker--my sweetie is so excited to be his own handyman. We've always just had the luxury of calling the property manager. I know it's hilarious considering all the other men we've had traipsing through here. (Most of them were kind of specialists.) He goes around the house making little pantomimed phone calls to himself requesting things to be fixed. I think maybe I need to set up a little clip board for the "Honey-do" stuff because he'll enjoy it so much. For a while...

I might poke fun at him a little--I mean 8 different men doing stuff around here!--but my sweetie has been quite the handyman in the last few weeks.

He:

• Hung 17 blinds. It was quite a chore, as they were in one big, messy pile in the garage, and there were no hangers. He's been to every Home Depot in the valley buying up the 3-4 they had in stock at each store. We should have ordered online, but we were kind of desperate for privacy.
  
• Figured out the garage door opener. He had to buy the remotes, which meant two trips to Home Depot and then finally to the garage door place on the other side of town.
  
• Changed all the locks.
• Changed the 9volts in the smoke detectors so they would stop beeping. True, not a big deal, but he had to buy a ladder to do it. He tried standing on phone book placed on a step stool, but he dropped the battery on his head. It made a ugly, bloody gash. The things still beeped, thus the immediate need for the ladder.
  
• Spent a few days figuring out how to get the front door to stay closed without the deadbolt on. A chisel was finally involved.
  
• Trimmed the tree in the front that looked like a bush and was covering half the driveway.
  
• Replaced toilet seats. Although, I told him that wasn't such a big job...he's done that before.
  

Okay, maybe that list doesn't sound very impressive. He does have some pretty big ideas of extending the patio and building an island for the kitchen. (My BFF, the weekend builder, was in town yesterday, and now she has a wild hair for her and Chris construct it themselves.)

In any case, so far he takes great joy wandering around the house looking for stuff to do. I'm sure it will wear off, but for how, it's kind of cool!