Sears 1, Sarah’s dread of having to deal with buying an air conditioner 0

And thank God, because I had a terrible experience the last time I bought an air conditioner. For starters, in my old apartment, the previous owners had cut a special hole in the window panel for their gigantic air conditioner, so I had two choices: I could buy a smaller air conditioner, balance it in the window, wait a beat, and watch it plunge nine stories into an inaccessible courtyard and smash into a quintillion pieces; or I could buy an equally gigantic air conditioner that fit the pre-existing hole and spend the rest of my life paying it off, because air conditioners that gigantic cost six hundred dollars, not counting tax. So, I bought the gigantic air conditioner, at an area appliance superstore which shall remain nameless, but which rhymes with “me see bitch nerd,” and which I now hate and will never do business with again, because on top of the six C notes plus tax for the AC, I had to pay a delivery charge, since throwing my entire weight against the box moved the behemoth exactly one quarter of an inch and I thus had no prayer of getting it home myself, AND I had to pay an installation charge, because see above.

But did delivery and installation occur at the same time? No. The delivery guys grunted and heaved and dumped the air conditioner in the middle of my apartment, dusted off their hands, and left, telling me that the installation guys would drop by “later.” I had already gotten rid of the old AC, of course, which left me with a gaping hole in the front wall through which bugs had chosen to zing at an alarming rate, and no AC in ninety-degree weather, and it turned out that “later” meant “in ten days,” so I called up Me See Bitch Nerd and screeched sweatily at someone or other and then went and lay down in a cold tub, and when the installation guys finally showed up, they spent two hours hacking at the windowsill and another two hours trying to bend the air conditioner’s sides with their minds before announcing to me, “Well, the thing don’t fit,” gathering up their tools, and leaving. LEAVING, people. And also, their tools included a mallet, which…the hell? Yeah, I’d love a quick croquet match, but the thing is, it’s hotter than the sun in here, because my air conditioner is sitting ON the FLOOR.

I eventually got the AC installed and the installation fee refunded, but not before marching into Me See Bitch Nerd and informing the manager that I would never buy so much as a line splitter from their crappy outfit ever again.

But if you won’t go to MSBN for major appliances, you have to go out to Jersey and go to Sears, and…love! Parked the car, marched in, pointed to a line in Consumer Reports, got escorted to that exact model and informed that it was on sale, paid, and picked it up at the merchandise drive-through. The whole process took twelve minutes. You can’t spell “Sears” without “Sars,” and I don’t plan to ever again. Yay, Sears!

Also, who knew ACs came with remotes now? And little lights that tell you when to clean the filter? And I could install it myself!

Well. Sort of.

Air conditioner 1, Mr. Stupidhead’s finger 0

Sorry, dude.

Mr. Stupidhead’s gushing finger 1, the area around my sink 0

Ew, dude.

Weather 3, Sarah 0

Okay, so I buy an air conditioner all early and whatnot, hearing that the temperature is supposed to hit the nineties on Sunday, behaving like a seasonally responsible adult, blah dee blah. It barely got to 83. So, that’s one point.

The weather scored another point with the humidity, because my hair can’t decide whether to look like a mollusk or an Eero Saarinen sculpture — except on days when I don’t see anyone I know, when naturally it looks flawless.

The weather also broke my TiVo. An admittedly very-cool-to-watch lightning storm a couple of weeks ago fried the modem, so I have to send the bastard back to them and hope they can fix it, which sucks, because I have umpteen Hitchcock movies on there that I want to watch, and also, the thing weighs a bomb and will cost a bomb to ship, and also, also, no TiVo.

I lived for many years without it, but once you go TiVo, you really can’t go back. I unplugged it last night, and seriously, I don’t think I can make it however long until they fix it and send it back. Last night, I’ve got The Sopranos on, and Little Joe is futzing around on my bureau, knocking shit onto the floor and gnawing on my earrings (…I know. Don’t get me started), and usually, I just pause the show and pluck him off the bureau, which he is nimble enough to get up onto but somehow too frail (read: fat) to get down from. But last night, I couldn’t pause. I couldn’t do anything! Books and lipsticks crashing to the floor, and I had to sit there and take it. Worst feeling in the world. Although, on the plus side, it turns out I’m a dead shot with a fork slingshot and a couple ravioli. On the minus side, CATS! HATE! AGH!

Cats 28,238,199,345,388, Sarah 2

Sigh. Hate. And actually, that should read “Ravioli 1, Little Joe’s forehead 0” and “Fragment of jalapeno that fell out of Sarah’s Subway sandwich and onto the floor 1, Little Joe 0,” but why get into it.

Just kidding. We totally have to get into it, because Little Joe’s all, “[Sniffy sniff sniff],” and I look over the edge of my plate all, “What the…ohhhh, don’t do it, fatty, you’ll regret it,” and I reach for the jalapeno fragment just as he picks it up, and then he goes, “[Nack nack nack. Kaff. Kaff? KAFF NYACK HERK FFRRLLAARK.]” Lather, rinse, repeat for fifteen minutes. Then he had a violent sneezing fit. Hobey is watching the whole thing from the couch like, “Heh. Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time, chubs.” Or maybe I said that, except I don’t think so because I couldn’t breathe from laughing hysterically.

The ravioli tale isn’t as good, primarily because the ravioli (“raviolo”? “raviolus”?) itself has vanished. Either it got batted under the bureau and is now hosting an ant farm, or someone ate it. Someone who is fat.

Plant 2, Little Joe 1

Heh. Ordinarily it’s a trial, but on occasion, cohabiting with the stupidest feline in the world has its amusements…like when the stupidest feline, having spent the morning eyeing the plant suspended from the curtain rod with amorous longing, clambers up onto a radiator and launches himself at the plant, and then the plant falls on his head. Or when I water the plant and leave it in the sink, and the stupidest feline snacks on the plant, and I catch him in the act, and he races off with a frond stuck in his teeth which he can’t seem to dislodge, pauses to shake his head rapidly, fails to dislodge the frond but succeeds in making himself dizzy, fattens his tail to the size of a basketball, and charges full-speed into the closet door.

Oddly, the plant doesn’t think it’s that funny. The plant hates me now. Maybe it’s because Joe nibbled its leaves into serrated shapes, but it looks all angry. Seriously.

In other news, if I can get my mitts on a Venus flytrap, it’s a party on my windowsill and you’re all invited.

Parking spaces 400, Sarah 0

If you park that goddamn Seville to take up two spaces in front of the post office, you’d better not have gone in to buy a single goddamn postcard stamp, sir. Hate.

Corner deli 12,392, Diet Coke 0

You can buy spark plugs, water guns, banana candy, and porn at the corner deli. It would kill them to restock the Diet Coke more than once a month? Dear corner deli guys: Twenty-ounce bottles. No lime, no lemon, no vanilla. Just the original champagne of colas. Get on that, or I’ll take my banana-candy business elsewhere.

The karate school around the corner 1, the nap Sarah attempted to take yesterday 0

Twenty-odd five-year-olds in teeny little ghis rocking the kindergarten-fu? So cute. Twenty-odd five-year-olds screeching “keeee-YAH” over and over again for an hour? So loud.

May 24, 2004

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