Service Fatigue

Trying to remember this week. It feels like it was busy. And sometimes cramming too many things in means you forget how the week started. Haha.

I think Monday was pretty average. Oh yes, it was that beautiful rainy soaking day. I thought I'd get out of my first day back at Boot Camp because of that one. But the weather cleared. However, it did not clear nearly fast enough for the traffic to sort itself back out again and instead of heading out to Boot Camp at the required time, I was only just arriving home (considering I usually arrive 15 - 20mins before this on a regular, read sunny, day). So yeah, I reveled in skipping it. Sometimes it feels easier to skip the first day ...

But, I did get myself there successfully on Tuesday. And then I headed to SCM, where we had a good dinner and a spectacular dessert!

The Trucker spent the night bottling the new batch of beer ... now we have a Porter (?) and a Bone Crusher settling before we can start drinking them in about 2 weeks. And yes, he's already bought the next batch! And he found a place that sells bottles at only R3 (instead of R5) so he bought a bunch of those. Just as well since he needed them before he could bottle this lot ... although we have worked our way thru a fair lot of the previous batch. He's also bought some 10L containers to try his hand at cider :)

On Wednesday I had to take my car in for a service. I hate this every time. Seriously. Why do people not offer amazing service in this country, it would require so few small changes. I take my car to Citroen Woodmead. Mostly thru lack of options. And it's had quite a few interim trips there since it's last service.

Anyway, back to how they can better themselves. They only open at 7am. Now I drive around Joburg between 6 & 6:30 in the mornings on my way to work, there are plenty of other people out and about at this time, trying to beat the traffic. But sure, why would you want to accommodate people, right? So I sat in their parking lot reading my book for half an hour.

Then you can pull your car into their garage and move your waiting into their sparse waiting area. Luckily I've learnt: they don't bother to offer their clients a wifi service, to minimise their impact on a work day. Such a simple thing. I haul out my laptop and tether it to my phone's data. I can work and not miss out my require billable hours. Because, not only am I gonna get into the office late, I'm gonna have to leave even earlier than usual to come and collect my car in time too :P

Usually I'd get a lift to the office, which only leaves at 8am. Because, you know, Sandton Traffic. People, wtf are you thinking? You aren't. And then you take the most circuitous route, usually dropping every one else off first. Of course.

And then there is the fact that they'll happily take you to your office, but they won't fetch you. Um, nothing has changed, you still have my car, I still can't get around. So now, not only should I end my work day earlier than usual to collect my car, but some other poor sap in my office has to take me there and then head all the way back to the office. Smart. So fucking smart. I hate having my car serviced.

Luckily this time I didn't need to use their lift service. I got collected by a colleague because a group of us were on our way to Tembisa to visit The Love Trust's school, Nokuphila. We're hoping to be able to help them with a Code 4 Purpose project. It was a very enlightening morning, so worth the visit.

I got my car back in the afternoon, only to discover, once I was home, that they hadn't freaking stamped the service book o_0 *eye-roll* And here's another thing I hate. If you make the mistake, why don't you make every effort to fix it instead of re-inconveniencing me. Yes, because although I was working from home yesterday, I had to go back to Citroen (and then continuing to the office just made more sense) .

Anyway, I'm over that now. Hopefully I will not own this car by the time it's next service rolls around! We went to test drive another Hyundai ix35 yesterday. OMG. It is an amazing car. But even with the trade-in they were offering me, with me taking some money out of the bond as a deposit and with The Trucker and I splitting the repayments, it is still just too expensive for us. So sad :( And this one was red! I loved it.

Anyway, I dunno what exactly our plan will be now. I need a new car so we'll probably get something in the interim, something smaller, but with 4 doors this time. Something realistically priced ;) Remind me I've always said I'm not a car girl.

And then on Wednesday evening I had dinner with @brownyngale at Doppio. So good to catch up :)

Yesterday, the added bonus of having to go into work half-way thru the day was that I wrapped and packed my Santa's Shoebox. Love it :)

Last night I managed to get back to Boot Camp. Yay me :) And then had a quite evening at home. The Trucker made a delish dinner! But I still feel we have hardly seen each other this week cause after dinner he was busy with fixing a client's computer and setting up his next batch of beer ...

Oh, but with dinner we did try the new Flying Fish beer (I saw the billboards so bought us some). I was a little skeptical since it is "flavoured beer" and I got the lemon and orange. But we actually really liked it. It's lighter than other beer and doesn't taste overwhelmingly of either flavour. I prefered the Orange and The Trucker liked the Lemon :)

Today I am working from home again. The perks of having no meetings and being solidly booked on a specific project. Yep, still loving this one :) And we have a busy weekend planned!