Some things, some times, just won’t go to plan

We've both been Project Managers.  Large corporations have been known to pay us quite large sums to manage projects and people.  Preparing for our adventure is another project for us - though it does have a much more delightful outcome!  We even have an online project plan on www.zoho.com - you've seen a screen dump on one of Nigel's earlier posts.

 But, no matter how good you are at planning, some things, some times, just won't go to plan.  It’s been a week of those.  Today all three areas of ‘issues’ have reared their difficult heads all in one day, and I’m going to let vent!  I hope you'll see the funny side!

A week ago we decided it was a good idea to upgrade the 250GB C: drive on my laptop.  It had seemed huge when I bought it three years ago.  Anyway, it was down to a spare 50GB, after I did some pruning, and my 80GB of videos have always been stored on an external drive.  So I set my sights on 750GB (wonderful!).  I took it back to the place I’d bought it from (and they shall remain nameless because they’re basically good guys) and paid extra to have the operating system and MS Office reinstalled and my data copied across from my old drive.  That all sounds good, so far!  Well, I went to pick it up and it wasn’t ready, so I went away for an hour and came back to pick it up.  Not too bad.  I got it home and after reinstalling some of the software that they couldn’t install (because they are downloads, not on disk) discovered they’d installed the 32 bit version of Windows 7 instead of the 64 bit version!!  In the morning they convinced me there was no difference.  Hmmm.  Then I discovered that a lot of my data hadn’t been copied across because it was at the top level of the C: drive instead of under my user data.  So, not wanting to wait for them, I restored from backup.  But I wasn’t absolutely certain I’d backed up all my old data to my most recent backup drive, so decided to be cautious and went back to them to get them to fire up the old drive so I could check.  I arrived as arranged (yesterday afternoon) and was told that ‘no’ it wasn’t as simple as that and I’d need to come back in the morning.  I suggested 9am and they agreed.  And I told them about my MS Office programs asking me to accept the user license agreement every time they fired up after a re-boot.  They said they’d need to call Microsoft to fix that one, and “it could take sometime”.  I didn’t like the sound of that so I did a Google search, or two or three, and resolved the issue myself in half an hour.  This morning I arrived late – I hate doing that – at 9:15am and the manager and the tech guy I needed to talk to were not there and I was told they were never in before 9:30am.  I’m embarrassed to say I let rip at the other guy.  Actually, I’m not too embarrassed – I wasn’t violent or rude (no swearing!).  I just said it wasn’t good enough, and that it had been a balls up from the start (oops – that probably does count as swearing, doesn’t it?), and that I was really angry about it.  As I charged out the door I think I even said something (silly) like "I'll be back!".  I don’t think he was very scared, and he was friendly and happy to accept my apology when I returned.  I’ve fired up the laptop but haven’t checked the files yet.  I’m thinking positively.  Everything’s going to be great!!

Then there’s the rental property in Dunedin.  Did we mention we’re getting it re-roofed and a few repairs done (like windows replaced) hopefully before we depart.  Email’s been great for keeping a record of everything, but getting the quotes sorted and managing the two companies doing the work has not always been a smooth process - a process that started at the beginning of March.  Three weeks ago I explicitly followed the roofers instructions to phone the power company to get the power cables wrapped so the roofers and builders wouldn’t get electrocuted while they were working on the house.  Sounds fair to me.  In the quote they go so far as to give the phone number to call and the exact words to say – they’ve obviously worked out that most of their clients are not familiar with the terms used to describe the electricity services we usually take for granted.  So the power company goes out and checks and comes back to say it’s not necessary, they’re already double insulated.  All good.  Except that today the roofer's come back to say that they’ve spoken to the power company; it’s the road cables that need to be wrapped and I need to approve the $650+gst fee for getting them wrapped.  So I’ve spoken to the power company guy – he says he’s confused too and he’s going out to the property.  I responded to the roofers and suggested they make a small improvement to their explicit instructions.  I really was very polite about it.  Promise!

I called our insurers the other day to let them know about the work being done on the rental.  I phoned the local office, where the insurance was arranged, and they said I needed to speak to the Dunedin office, so they transferred me.   Very pleasant and helpful Rob in the Dunedin office said he highly recommended we take out construction insurance because if things went wrong the builder's and roofer’s insurance would protect them, but not necessarily us, and I had to go into our local office to organise that and to take along copies of the quotes for the work, and I needed to know when the work would start and when it would end because it would cost a lot more to extend the insurance once it had started and if the insurance ended before the work ended we wouldn’t be covered for that period. Phew!  So, this morning, while I seethed about being ‘stood-up’ by the computer guys, I dashed off to the insurance company.  And there I was told they don’t do construction insurance in Christchurch (because of the earthquakes) and have no staff qualified to offer it for other locations.  They gave me the name of the best person to speak to in the Dunedin office.  Have you guessed the name yet?  Yes – Rob!!

Yes - I know it was supposed to be three gripes - but another opportunity has arisen, a WTF moment - and if you don't know what that stands for, I'm not going to tell you - it contains a rude word!  We're selling the Honda.  We've already had one scammer email us through the Buy, Sell Exchange ad.  Now I've received this corker from Trademe:
Hi there i am very interested in the Honda number plate surrounds/frames. I have the new edition ones i can give you on exchange if you're interested? I'm happy to pay for them also, and i will give you these new ones too. Regards Jackie
We're selling a car, for goodness sake!  Why in the world would we want to start pulling bits off it?  We didn't list it under 'Car parts and accessories'.  I'm astounded.  And will resist any temptation I may have had to respond.

So now I've listed my gripes, I'll also take a moment to remember that we had a fantastic garage sale last Saturday, the Mazda sold and went to a new, loving home on Wednesday, and various bits of furniture and other bits have been walking out the door in exchange for money all week.  And friends and family still love us.  Happy days!