48 posts tagged “mr fd”

Washing day at W. H. Corkhill's home Marengo, with Gertrude McKern and Maude Bate aust

When I had a Monday-Friday job, Saturday was naturally laundry day. Every week I would have to ask Mr FD to carry the laundry hamper downstairs for me, as it was often too heavy for my back. May I repeat, EVERY Saturday I had to ASK Mr FD to bring down the laundry hamper from our bathroom.

Now, I don't have a Monday to Friday routine, and I do laundry during the week, trying to leave the weekends free. You know, just in case the last threads of our sanity tear and we give in to spontaneity, heaven forbid!

NOW that I no longer do laundry on a Saturday, every Saturday without fail, WITHOUT A REQUEST, Mr FD brings down the laundry hamper and places it with pride in the middle of our small laundry. It sits there like a dog poop on your priceless heirloom rug. I say nothing, trying to ignore it, but oddly enough it makes me want to rip his throat out.

I do not do the laundry. It sits there until the day I do, in the meantime, our dirty clothes mount up on the floor of our bathroom. I prefer not to say anything as when I am back in the work force I will no doubt want him to bring that damn laundry hamper down each and every Saturday again.

I just want to know - does he know what he is doing? Is he playing games with me - stirring the lizard he calls it. Passive aggressive games of marriage...sigh. Or did he just finally get the message through his damn thick skull and is now probably wondering why I am not postulating myself at his feet in gratitude?

Is it him, or is it me? I know, it's him. It is always him. 

Tuesday night:

FD rolls over in bed.

Mr FD : Be careful!

FD: What?

Mr FD : Be careful of the chicks!

FD: Chicks? We have chicks in our beds?

Mr FD : Penguin chicks.

FD: How many penguin chicks are in our bed?

Mr FD : Lots - 8 to 12 at least.

FD : We have 8 to12 chicks sleeping in our bed with us?

Mr FD : Yes, so be careful when you move.

FD: If they poop on the sheets I won't be happy

Mr FD : Oh they won't do that, they have diapers.

FD : Of course they would! How long are these chicks staying with us in our bed

Mr FD: I don't know, awhile. Until their parents come back for them.

FD: And where are their parents?

Mr FD; On holiday.

FD: You are making them breakfast. 

Wednesday night

Mr FD : I am going public

FD: Going public about what?

Mr FD : Tiger Woods and I.

FD : You've had an affair with Tiger too?

Mr FD: Yes. I feel so used now.

FD: Where did you meet him?

Mr FD : In the valley [night area].

FD: What were you wearing?

Mr FD : A tight little number. Blue, orange, a splash of red.

FD: Did you wear heels?

Mr FD: Oh course! And sequins. It was kind of a jumpsuit thing.

FD: Do you think you will recover?

Mr FD : I feel sooooo used...sigh 

Now that Mr FD is working from home and I am mistress of my own time, he has taken to asking me to accompany him on short trips about town, such as if he is dropping seed off for testing and knows he won't be away from the car long. I take a drink bottle and a book and sit under the shade of a tree for a few minutes if the car is too hot.

However, I draw the line at his whistling and calling "here girl!" when he wants to leave.

We are not amused...

Mr FD has a new car...

2 comments

Mr FD has had his new car for 10 days or so now. He wanted to reset the trip meter and so spent an hour going through the handbook trying to discover how to do so. He was instructed to use the multi function display toggle knob but could not find it pictured in the handbook. After the hour I suggested he actually go out and "fiddle with things" in the car. Within minutes he was toggling with excitement [ perhaps a slight exaggeration, but he did achieve his goal].

MR FD's mobile office

Mr FD is making an early return from his Northern Queensland business trip. He apparently has to make an unexpected trip to China - as one does! I think he is coming home to change underwear.  Daughters1 and 2 have both sent texts to warn him not to steal state secrets or bribe anyone (in reference to recent arrests of Australian Rio Tinto exectutives in China). He does tend to find trouble wherever he goes - lost coat in Hong Kong, stolen luggage and passport in Holland, forgotten phone charges up and down the eastern Australian seaboard - that they have every reason to worry.

I will focus on the postives - what he can buy for me on the trip!

Yesterday Mr FD and I experienced two ends of customer service - the good, the bad and the bad was ugly.

As mentioned in a previous post, Mr FD and I have been in the process of buying a car for the company that Mr FD is currently setting up. He started some two week ago on this process and he told everyone involved that he needed the car to leave on an extended trip last Monday. He just wanted the basic car, happy to choose from the colours on the show floor. Wanted no extras - oh except floor mats which now cost $180AUS for 4 rubber floor mats! Mr FD made call after call, repeating his need and his deadline. No one listened. They all heard what they wanted to hear, and then covered up with excuses of "fax didn't arrive" ,  "missed the deadline and head office won't process until tomorrow" and "they are out of the office and I'll leave theme a message" . Where do you leave the message? On the toilet wall of the business next door?

Anyway, we finally got the call to collect the car. We made an appointment for 2.30pm. When we arrived our saleswoman was nowhere to be seen. She was out on a test drive with another customer, even though we had an appointment and knew Mr FD had to leave that afternoon on an extended trip. A number of salesmen walked by us without even acknowledging that we were human and breathed. Eventually we made enough noise to be noticed and demanded to be served. A very junior member of the team took us through signing the papers and then she found a poor salesman who had a leg in a cast and couldn't make an exit to go through the car with Mr. FD. I made little effort to make small talk with Junior Girl as she kept up this charade of our Saleswoman returning at any moment, weeping over her unintended absence. Oh yeah.

An hour later we are driving out of the show room and Saleswoman appears. She throws herself in fron of our car and reefs open Mr. FD's door and screams "Congratulations " as though we had just given birth and not gone into spasms more of heart breaking debt. Then she plants a big lipsticky kiss on his cheek, something that normally would have his heart go into overdrive. THEN she runs to the otherside of the car and reefs open MY door, and rubs her cheek against mine. I take particular note of her name badge and facial features to add her to my stick list. I had never met this woman before, Mr FD had only ever spoken to her over the phone. Not a word of "sorry" even though "I knew that you were driving an hour to get here, and had an appointment with me, and were short of time". Nope, She had our money and she was onto the next sale. Customer service? I think not. Next company car, and there will be one or two or three, won't be bought from her.

On the other side, earlier that morning, a real estate salesman left his comatose mother to drive over an hour to bring some papers to us for signing as he knew Mr. FD needed to sign them before he left yesterday. [We are renting warehouse space]. While we were signing, the LOVELY [HANDSOME] Salesman received a phone call to inform him that his mother had just woken from the coma. She had been involved in a car accident a day or so previously. So this man spends 3 hours away from his possibly dying mother as he knew how important his role was in the next step of Mr FD's business. [If we had known before the meeting we would have gone to his office]

Wait there is a 3rd tale of service. Mr FD is in the seed business, pasture seed mainly. He had bought some seed and organized for it to be sent to a depot for delivery. Yesterday morning there is a knock at our front door, Mr FD goes outside and there is a delivery truck driver outside. The delivery man says "Got a pallet of seed, here for you, mate." They sent the damn seed to our residential address despite Mr FD making it obvious the residential address was for billing purposes only! The poor delivery driver had in fact alerted his office that they were sending him to a residential address with a pallet of seed, but they wouldn't listen or double check the details, so the poor delivery driver drove across town only to be told that "yes, that is right, this is the wrong address", and to have to drive back across town to the depot.

So not only are they giving bad customer service to their customers but they are giving bad customer service to each other. Your co-workers deserve as much as your customers, if not more.

To me, it is easier to do the right thing, and to do the right thing first time around than to do to the pretence dance. And if MR FD asks you to help him make a deadline - just remember there is a Flamingo Dancer with a stick list standing behind him.

[Stick list : list of names of all the people I am going to hit with a stick one day soon]

Is that a dragon I see before me?

Night 1:

Flamingo Dancer returns from the bathroom and Mr FD asks:

"Did you see any dragons?"

"Yes," said I. "They were bar-b-queing the yaks"

"I hope there are some leftovers for breakfast" he says and goes back to sleep.

Night 2:

Mr FD returns from the bathroom and I  ask:

"Did you see any dragons?"

"Dragons!" Mr FD exclaims. "I am sick of slaying dragons. Day in, day out, nothing but dragon slaying. At least they could keep it down to one a day." He returns to bed and goes back to sleep.

Dragons and yaks in our backyard...the neighbours are not going to be happy at all.