Ma & Pa Kettle & the Repair Man

Ma & Pa Kettle & the Repair Man

 I just had an experience that came out of the blue.  I must state now that it is not sad, on the contrary I find it absolutely hilarious.  Here it go

  Once upon a time after semi retiring from the road, a couple of musicians chose to live at home for a while.  It is a remote area that 30 years ago had no access to any tv stations except one, maybe two on a good day. Old tv antenna that would move in the wind.  We didn’t care, we just used vhs tapes if we wanted something other than that one station.  We were not home long enough to care.   As time changed, so did our interest & wants.  Not needs, we didn’t NEED tv, we chose to brainwash ourselves with the option of having it.  So the best way to do this was to sign up for a satellite dish. We found that DirectTV had everything we wanted & at the time the package was affordable for us.  Turns out that we are now a grandfathered in clients with special perks if we talk to them every few months to check in.  I think they want to make sure we still have a pulse. We are now a long term customer & they like us…    A LOT.  

  Thru out time we have swapped out the receivers cause we outlived them. They have upgraded the little dish & the eye in the yard cause we outlived them too.  Every time work is done we sign our active lives away in loyalty to them for another two years at a time.  We don’t have the fanciest package mind you, we have one up from the bottom.  Just enough infomercials, old movies & hgtv that we can stomach with local channels for $3. A month just cause we are their favorite people.

  They gave me a free cell phone when AT&T merged with Direct TV, cause we were their favorite people. They even sold me a little micro cell tower so we can get access here in the boonies that normally we did not have.  We bought another cell phone for Rog thru them cause of this deal they made me on the free one.  So far so good.   Friday I called them because the current receiver had died, I have a protection plan that allows me to make that call & they send me a new one, I package up the old one & put it in the same box never to be seen again after I send it back.  It arrived on Monday. This time however, we ended up with a refurbished one that did not work…. *GASP*  This made me begin to doubt my favorite person status.  So on the phone I go.  Today is Tuesday, they sent me a hands on dude on a house call to assist me in my plight.  He was prompt, he came in the middle of a 4 hour window noon to 4pm.   Nice youngster.   Here is where the heart of the story comes in.

Roger had just woke up from the phone call comin from a graveyard shift about the repair guy .  So he looked less than perky, stumbling around with a cup of coffee, not standing as straight up as normal cause he’s still half sleepin. I was in my not so nice moo moo with my dirty Sally hair doo as I had been up all night as well from the day before.  We were making sure the dogs were not goosing him as he made his way into the living room. On the wood burner was dinner cooking so the air was filled with a roast with onions cookin the old way over an open flame.  The kid was polite, went about his business with a smile.  When he went out to his van to get some tools, it hit me…. I could not stop laughing.

  I remember back when we were first married that Roger worked in radio & tv servicing & was an electronic tech.  He dreaded house calls with a passion.  He would end up working in some houses that were not  in any way magazine cover dwellings.  Dirty is an understatement for some, hoarders, you name it.  He went to some houses that he just had to take a shower when he got home before he did anything else.   I would ask “how was your day”, he would grumble.. they had a cat, there was unidentified possible food smells from a week ago still lingering in the house,  he had to yell cause they could not hear him, every nightmare of a service call, he lived it.  He shared it with me.

As I sat with him at the table… I glanced at him in his not quite awake mode with his white hair pulled back but wild as Zorba the Greek’s,  & then caught a glance of me in the mirror & saw granny Clampet, the stove had “unidentified food” smells coming from it.  Need I go on.    I could not stop laughing as I told Roger what I saw & what we had become.  WE WERE HIS NIGHTMARE OF SERVICE CALLS.   So… naturally I had to address this with the young man.   He laughed in acknowledgement at the facts I stated.  He said he didn’t mind old people really.  ….. long pregnant pause … HE DID NOT DISAGREE LOL LOL LOL .    

  A few mintues of him doing his work, my phone rang… it was lets say… a rock & roll call, one where someone is calling me for my career of the past pertaining to music, the rocker in me took the phone & the house frau took a back seat.   He looked at me like I just did a jeckel hyde on him.   We ended up talking about a few things, laughin & before it was over I got the feeing that he wished he had not finished up so soon.  I still looked like a house frau but I think he saw thru my disguise & knows that I am an old rockin road dog that still had a pulse after all.  Rog also gave him a few pointers that came out of the blue that showed he had a history that still was applicable in there as well concerning what he was doing to our satellite system.  Ahhhh.   Shock & ahhhh.     

  The direct tv works again.  Happy campers.  Repair guy is gone, dinner is ready, dogs are back in, tv is playin some cool Tom Petty show.    Time for libations.   Never judge a book by it’s cover.   I did & I know better. Even tho I wrote the book “it is my autobiography”  I sometimes forget or take for granted what is in the chapters that sometimes shows up… even with a different cover on it.