Posts by Berck

So, the windshield people replaced my windshield with the correct one for the originally agreed upon $147.40. Yay.

Also, have I mentioned that How I Met Your Mother is the best TV show ever?

I miss the night. Staying up late meandering about the internet and listening to music has always been one of my favorite activities. When I’m a little sleepy, a little free, a little dark… what I want to do is write. I’m not any good at it anymore, mostly because I don’t do it. I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.

I wonder if, perhaps, I’m stressed. While I don’t feel stressed, it seems like I should be. Maybe I’m a bit anxious. My job is going to be gone in September, and I could have the same job for twice the money in a few months, or I could be totally out looking for work. The looking for work doesn’t bother me too much in that I can find something utilizing my skills that pays at least what I make now. But there’s Jonah. She doesn’t know what she wants, and as far as I can tell, this is the only job she’s had that she likes. To find another job, I’d almost assuredly have to move. For the first time in my life, I don’t want to move yet. This is new. If I did move, it would have to be to Alaska– where else?

What do I want to do? I’m pretty sure I don’t want to be a flight instructor forever. I grow restless with it– as though it’s time for something new. I wonder how long a change of scenery 60 miles south (where the scenery isn’t as pretty) would keep me content. I worry about making that much money– it’d be really hard to walk away from it. But when I die, I want to have done more than be a DA-20 pilot. I want to do something cool like fly an otter on skis, or a fire-bomber.

It’s almost as though I’ve settled back into the nether-world of not knowing what I want. The importance of having a goal isn’t important like so many people say it is, but it offers a certain sort of comforting distraction. The difference this time is that I’m happy where I am. It’s just that I’d rather be struggling toward something.

Perhaps I need something new to tinker with. Maybe it’s time to buy a cheap motorcycle– it’s just that I’m not ready to die, and buying a motorcycle is embracing death a bit more closely than I already do on a day to day basis.

I wonder how many times I can listen to this song before Jonah gets mad.

In many ways, I hate that I have a blog. I shouldn’t have a blog. I hate blogs. Don’t I?

It’s not spring yet, but I think winter is dead. Sadly, I missed the best it had to offer while wallowing around in the south. It was something of a mistake, spending so much time in the south. My mother tried to warn me, I should have listened. Not that I minded spending time with any of you, just that it was too long. If I was going to take a month off, I should have driven to South America or something. I felt guilty about having been so long without visiting family, but I think a much more sane policy will be that family can come to us if they want– it works better that way. Joanna and Sydney agree, at least.

It’s not warm out yet, not time for the hard tops to come off the cars, but it’s not winter either. The snow storms have turned into pathetic little tantrums that give into the sun before they even develop. I hate this nether-region. I want it to be cold, or I want it to be t-shirt weather. (But, please, please, not hot.) It’s February, but I think I would be okay if I never again experience temperatures greater than 75F.

Why should you read this? You shouldn’t.

I don’t mind living in an apartment, but I want a cat and a garage. And that means a house. Maybe we’ll buy a house if I get hired down south. There’s something fascinating about standing where I am, with a September deadline. The anxiety seems like it should be there, but there’s a morbid fascination with possibility. I see any number of possibilities for a year from now. I could be working and making money and paying off debt and living right here with little else being different. I could have a job for some crappy airline, commuting to work on airliners, getting paid nothing, but getting some precious multi time and invaluable experience while sitting in the right seat with someone who will keep death an arm’s length from the left seat. I could be desperate, out of work, broke. It’s all there, all a possibility. What do I want? Does it matter what I want?

We wait all day for night to come, and it comes…

I got one flight in this morning before the wind picked up. Since our second flight was canceled, a few of us decided to head over to Famous Dave’s for lunch. Shortly after ordering, my flight suit started vibrating.

(The following sentence for Sydney. To the rest of you, I apologize.) I retrieved my personal communications device from the zippered orifice in my flight suit, performed a bifurcation maneuver upon it, placed it to my auditory organ and coerced my vocal cords to say, “Hello?”

Joanna sounded upset. Yesterday, I’d given her the task of phoning through the book to find the cheapest auto glass replacement people and arranging to have them replace the badly cracked and sandblasted 16 year-old windshield in the red car. It seems that they had come over and replaced the windshield but wanted payment in cash or check only. She didn’t have a check with her, and certainly didn’t have $140 in cash. She asked if she could go get the cash from an ATM, I told her that would be fine… then I asked if they did an acceptable job. “Well, um, there’s this green band of tinting on the top of the windshield…” “Yeah, that’s totally unacceptable.” “Well, that’s what I told them, but then the manager started yelling at me, and said if I didn’t pay, he’d call the police, and…” on and on and on. The short of it was the guy was going to be there in ten minutes, so I got my lunch to go, hopped in my car and sped up to Monument. Of course the window people were not there when I got there.

I ate some of my lunch, and decided to call them. The conversation was long and drawn out. First, he tried to tell me that he told Joanna personally that the window would be tinted (he did not), and that cash or check was the only accepted form of payment (he did not). I fail to see how telling a customer that his wife is a liar is a good tactic. After he droned on and on about what happened (not at all the version of events Joanna relayed, but at this point, moot anyway) without letting me interupt him, I got to the point. “The point is, you’ve installed the incorrect windshield. The windshield you removed is clear, the one you replaced it with is not.” He then tried to argue that everyone in Colorado Springs replaces windows with tinted windows, no one wants clear ones. Whatever, not the point. Eventually, he demanded that I pay him $147.50 today, and tomorrow he’d send out an installer to install a new clear windshield for an additional charge of $60 because they were more expensive. The only places that mentioned a difference in price between clear and shaded when Joanna called said the clear ones were cheaper. I pointed this out, and he muttered. I told him that was unacceptable and that I wouldn’t be giving him any money until he installed the correct windshield. He responded by saying he would have the installer return with police escort and replace the tinted windshield in my car with my original windshield. I called his bluff, “That’ll actually be perfect, I assume they can do it today?” “Well, you realize we’ll still have to charge you for the labor.” “You can charge me all you want, but I’m only going to pay for the work I originally asked you to do, which is to install the correct windshield in my car, which you haven’t done. I’ll gladly see you in small claims court.” He then launched into a diatribe about he gets ripped off for thousands of dollars a year, blah, blah, blah. I pointed out that everytime I have anyone work on my car, I get ripped off, so I do it all myself, but there was no way for me to replace my own windshield. He then agreed, and launched into a sob story about how he’s getting ripped off by a transmission company. This sort of thing went on for a very long time. He eventually said that he’d send an installer by tomorrow with a clear windshield, and I’d have $147.50 in cash for him when it was finished.

We’ll see what happens tomorrow.