PHARMACIST STEVE

Today we traveled from our Indiana home to our Florida condo… we had to travel in my 1999 F-150 because of the tools I had to bring to do repairs at the condo after Hurricane Michael took the roof of the complex Oct 10.2018..

We are zipping right along in Southern Alabama and all of a sudden the radio starts acting up… trying to get to work without any luck and then the blower on the AC seems to slow down and not really cooling… so I turn it off and was going to roll down the windows  – power windows of course – NOTHING…  then it started raining and the windshield wipers won’t work… luckily I had put RAIN-X on the windshield a couple of days before we left… very good stuff.. especially when your wipers won’t work … I grab my Iphone and tell SIRI  “FIND ME A FORD DEALER”… luckily one is 7.2 miles ahead… the trucks seems like it is mis-firing… and then all 6 dash instrument drop to ZERO… no speedometer, no tachometer, no oil pressure, no engine temp … you get the point…

It is now about 130 local time ON A FRIDAY as we roll into the dealership parking lot and the truck DIES… turn the key and it is DOA..  They have to push it into the work bay..

The gal who is service coordinator at the dealership… tells me that they have a whole list of jobs that have to be done TODAY…   I am 150 miles from the condo… a wife … a dog and a “dead truck”… doesn’t look like this is going to be a good day…  My trusty old truck that I bought new in 1999 and had only failed to start once in all this time – failed fuel pump… and it picks here and now to PLAY DEAD..

Luckily the shop manager took mercy on us… they quickly diagnosed the problem as a alternator failing – hell it was only 21 yrs old…. the original alternator on the truck from 1999 and that I had been running totally off the battery for god knows how long today…  The alternator was only putting out 9 volts and I think that it is suppose to put out 14 volts +/-

Abt 2 hrs later and a $500+ charge… for a new alternator and battery – the battery was 3 + yrs old… so I wasn’t going to argue about a battery..  I knew that because I keep a list of maintenance on my vehicles in my IPHONE   🙂  …  and we are back on the road…

Then we get to our condo…. remember Hurricane Michael took the roof off of the place Oct 10,2018 and the place is still not “open” and they are optimistically hoping that they will be able to start renting units again by Jan 1, 2020… Out unit is our second home and we don’t rent it… so we didn’t loose a year+ of revenue like the 90 odd units that do rent.

We were down here the last week of May and what drywall work that had been done… I was not very pleased with… but .. apparently a newer crew came in and fixed all the bad “mudding” work..  We knew that we had some work that we were going to have to do …. and had allowed abt 8-10 wks.. to accomplished…that may prove to be a gross under estimation… Both Barb and I are now in our 70’s and 12 hr days… are no longer a option.

On top of all of this… I was told last week that the Association’s insurance had not given them any money since April and payroll a week or so ago was not made… the general contract and all the people working on the building – WALKED….  the guy that maintain the grounds around here left sometime during the winter, the general manager left the end of May and after no paycheck two maintenance workers left…. so the entire staff… includes… a maintenance supervisor ( I think ), a receptionist, a bookkeeper and there was one of our regular security staff when we arrived tonight…

Other than that … everything is SUNSHINE, LOLLIPOPS and ROSES…

So if you don’t hear from me for several days… I have not died… although there is a chance that I may be in jail if I get my hands on some of the construction workers that have been in my unit working…

Over the next few days, I going to have all the doors re-keyed and there is a NEW SHERIFF IN TOWN… anyone who wants in my unit to work will be under my direct supervision…  and there is going to be two ways to do anything .. the WRONG WAY….. and… MY WAY !!!!

Filed under: General Problems