Frustration

It has been a trying couple of days. Carol has a very nice and very expensive long arm quilting machine. We took it into Savannah last week because it was skipping stitches. Not a good thing when you are quilting. The shop where we took it said it looked like a simple problem and it would be ready on Monday at the latest. We were in South Carolina on Monday and Carol had a class yesterday in Garden City. We decided this morning we would go pick it up. The tech guy working on it said he had done every possible adjustment on the machine and could not get it to stitch correctly all the time. He relayed that a job like this would normally take him about an hour. He would clean everything and set the timing. Job done. He did all that, adjusted tensions on the upper and lower thread, adjusted the hook in, out, up and down but nothing fixed the problem. He changed the needle. No effect. He suggested replacing the hook and would order the part. We said go ahead. Maybe it will be ready next week. When we got home a phone call was made to the store in Illinois that sold us the machine. They suggested all the things that had been done already. One important detail they added. They had a machine that behaved like ours and it had to be sent back to the manufacturer to be repaired. We called them and got the same list of things to do. Advised they had all been done and we were going to try replacing the hook. If that didn't work then the machine had to go back to them. It has to be returned in the original box. The original box and packing materials are in Illinois. We are in Georgia. Jeremy is going to UPS us the box.

Problem number two. For Christmas I bought Carol a Club Car Precedent golf cart. She wanted one to drive around the island. It needed to have seat belts, horn, brake lights and turn signals added. The place where we bought it suggested a shop on Tybee Island so we went and talked to the owner. No problem. Here's what you need to order. So everything arrives. Seat belt bar is wrong. Ordered another one from a different company. Original needs to be shipped back. Guy who is going to do the lights is busy but finally came by yesterday. Poked, prodded, cursed and said he would pick it up later in the week and get everything done. "Never seen one wired quite like this one." Not the reassuring words you want to hear.

So that is my life at the moment. A golf cart that runs but no where to run it because it isn't street legal without the modifications. A long arm sewing machine that currently is a very expensive paperweight or desk ornament. Really folks. Thousands of dollars tied up in a couple of things that are useless. I am frustrated and jealous. Being useless is my retirement gig. I don't need the competition.