Hiya, boys and girls. 🙂
Happy Friday! Hope y’all have had a fantastic one.
I sit here at my computer… 1:25 a.m., staring at the flight plan of a trip I’m contemplating.
New Zealand, at the least, and Australia as well if I want. Month and a half? Should I do it? Deal is offered for fewer than 24 hours. Absolutely fantastic price–fantastic. Round trip to New Zealand from my little local airport for $911–and that’s in Auckland and out of Christchurch. That’s the best travel option, in my opinion.
Amazing deal.
But can you go on that trip without going to Australia as well?!?! But good prices to Australia mean that I need to stay in Australia for a month. 🙃 Two weeks in the big NZ followed by a month in Australia?
My life is so upside down right now. Can I really take a trip like that?!?! Right now?!?!
And… alone. 😕 I don’t have anyone to go with. All my friends are married and… busy with their families.
I’ve done a lot of traveling alone. I’ve had some amazing trips and a mountain of fun stories, but it’s always more enjoyable to go with someone.
(sigh)
What to do… what to do…
I’m… undecided. Going on the trip would be a huge stress on its own–adding to the stress I carry right now. But would it also relieve stress to be away? Help focus perspective?
I don’t know.
Great price, but I’ve never been on a trip longer than 5 weeks before, and that was back when I was 21. I’m almost double that age now.
And… alone.
What to do. What to do…
As for the day, it was… a bit of a wash in some ways and productive in others. The first job, which I thought was going to be a long, well-paying job, turned out to be a bad diagnosis by the customer, and a lot simpler than expected. That said, the part wasn’t available, and the customer was… frustrating. The particular culture of the customer is one that tries to bargain. But they don’t just try to bargain, they push and press and push and manipulate in an effort to guilt trip you into lower prices.
Don’t know what it was today, but I finally had it. After giving him a $50 discount on what I’d quoted, when it turned out to be something simpler, I didn’t want to deal with the bargaining and pushing and manipulating, so I just told him I’d give him 50% off the day’s visit. When I told him the price, he still wanted to round down. That was the last straw for me. I handed him the the part he needed and told him it was time for him to find another mechanic.
That shocked him pretty good. His demeanor changed in a flash. You could see the fear that he was losing his mechanic. He begged and begged and apologized profusely and wouldn’t even let me close the door to my van. I eventually relented, after he promised not to try to bargain anymore, and I’ll be doing the job tomorrow–at my quoted price.
(sigh)
I really struggle with people from that particular culture in that particular circumstance (financial transactions). It’s super uncomfortable to be guilt tripped and pressured and to deal with the attempted manipulation. I’m sure it sounds awful, but as soon as I hear that particular accent on the other end of the phone, my heart sinks a bit. Not bad people, just… really frustrating/uncomfortable cultural trait to deal with, and the overhwhelming majority of my customers from that culture engage in the same practices.
I’m sure I embody cultural traits that are bothersome to others. But today, this one was just too much.
After that, we ended up going to lunch at Cracker Barrel because the other jobs had canceled, so it was a rare nearly empty day.
In order to get Malaki some work hours, I brough him home and paid him to help with some yard work chores that I’ve wanted to get done–just little things, but things nonetheless.
So we both worked outside for a couple hours before I got a call from someone out by the lake who needed help with his truck; so we drove out. He had a 2019 Dodge Ram 2500 6.7 diesel. He’d actually called in the morning wanting help, but he didn’t want my help then. He asked how much a starter was going to be, but I told him it almost certainly wasn’t the starter. But he decided to change the starter anyway–which… didn’t fix it, of course. He just had some really dead batteries that couldn’t start the engine even though they had voltage. They had voltage but not cranking amps.
So… that one was easy.
Malaki went home after that, and I finished mowing the lawn that hadn’t been mowed in over two months, I think. That took a long time, as it had finally rained a bit, so there was some super tall grass that I had to mow really slowly and go over twice.
But it’s done.
It’s after 2 now… time for bed. Good night, folks.
Love and hugs.
Lift the World
~ stephen
Lift the World 