So it started like this. There were a few light bulbs and a flourescent tube which needed changing at the shop. I usually procrastinate when it comes to changing lights, cause I figure might as well wait for more to blow so I can fix them all in one shot and save time!! heh...
Then one day the faucet at the back started leaking.... or spurting water from the base would be more accurate... like a fountain in fact!! That, unfortunately, couldn't be postponed. It was totally unusable until the faucet was completely changed to a new one.
So, I called the plumber and asked him to come help and have a look at the shower as well which had very low water pressure for a quite a while already. He said he would come the next day.
Guess what? The next day came and no plumber. I called him and he didn't answer my calls!! I tried a different number and even tried calling from another phone in hopes of tricking him into answering, but noooo... he was ignoring me!!!!!!!!!! The gall!!
I really can't understand these people. If you do not want to come, just tell me! Is it so hard???
So I was really pissed and wondered why we had to beg and plead for their help. It isn't rocket science is it?? Pipes and faucets?! Driven by annoyance and rage, I decided to do it myself. I know Hubby doesn't like doing these things and would just give me another number to call, so I didn't bother complaining to him. He was so stressed with work and matters so much more severe compared to broken faucets anyway!
Thus, I went to the hardware store a total of four times over two days.
First, I went to get the energy saving bulbs, a 4 foot fluorescent tube, a shower head and hose as well as a nice new shiny kitchen faucet. I also got a spanner which I thought I would need when changing the faucet and shower hose.
Then, I went back to the shop and changed the lights without incident, as I was quite used to doing that.
Later, I discovered my spanner was stuck and had to go back to the hardware store a second time to change it to another working one.
Then came the kitchen faucet. I had no problem removing the old one and installing the new one. Only the extension for the filtered water wouldn't come off the old faucet. It was stuck fast. I tried the spanner, pliers and even asking the guys next door, but to no avail. So I brought the old faucet and went back to the hardware store a third time and asked the uncle for help!
This is when he used his monkey wrench and effortlessly unscrewed the offending extension. Wow! I had to get me one of those!
So I went and finished up the faucet and started on the shower. Apparently the hose was leaking, which was why there was little water pressure. When I tried to unscrew the old hose, one end was stuck to the pipe. The water pipe was of course mounted onto the wall and I couldn't possibly remove it to bring to the hardware store uncle to unscrew, so the only option was... to get my own monkey wrench!
I didn't have anymore time to play Handy Manny that day, as I had to continue my school bus driver job, so I went to sleep that night thinking of my monkey wrench! Hahahaha...
The next day, I of course went back to the hardware store (me again Uncle!!) to get me that cool monkey wrench! I mean, with one of these babies, who needed men anymore eh????!!
So with the aid of the right tools and a helpful hardware store uncle, I did not need to grovel for help, so there!!
I am also very much influenced by my mum, who was definitely not a damsel-in-distress kind of mum! She could do just about anything, I remember once watching her open the sewage tank and unclogging it!!!
* R E S P E C T *
She was without doubt the all-powerful original Supermum!! :)
Well, anyway, since I was on a roll, I decided to get that new CD/ MP3 player/ radio for my shop. My old cassette player (cassette - that shows you how old it is!!) just died a few days before. So I got a nice Sony one and wanted to put the speakers high up on my shelf, so as not to take up too much workspace. Thus I had to play electrician this time to extend the speaker cables.
All this reminds me of Kemahiran Hidup, a subject we had to do in secondary school. It included woodwork, plumbing and electronics. I liked all the hammering, soldering and creating circuits with blinking lights which had no particular function! Hahaha.. I think that subject in school was extremely practical, useful and fun to boot!
I've always liked taking apart then putting back the radio and VCR player at home when I was small. It was my job to get the video tapes out of the player when they got tangled inside.
All this also reminded me of the time when Hubby taught me how to hack the public phone!!
It was like this. We were 18 and I was studying in KL while Hubby had gone back to Kuching. Back then, we didn't have Skype or even hand phones to make cheap interstate calls. So calls were expensive and we had to be ever 'creative'!!
There were a few ways to hack phones. Sometimes someone would pass you a really long series of numbers to punch into the phone, after which you could make free calls! Those wouldn't work for very long. I remember calling Sis no.3 from my college, Taylor's College at Subang. Sis no.3 was in New Zealand then!
Another method the guys discovered was that certain card phones (one was at the then Kuching Plaza) could be manipulated. They put in cards with full credit, then made the call and somehow removed the card and quickly replaced it with an empty one! I understand it took some skill! lol
So I was then living at my Aunt's house, at SS1 PJ. There was a park there with a payphone. That was my target...
First I took a spare house phone. Then I took the cable and snipped off the end that's supposed to go into the small box thingie on the wall. There are two wires in that cable and I connected those to crocodile clips.
Then I'd go to the park with the phone and an umbrella.
See the black box/ stand/ pillar at the bottom? That could be opened and all the circuits were inside. With the umbrella blocking me from other people's view, I used the crocodile clips to clip on exposed connections. The wire connectors with screws was the weak point. I just clipped the crocodile clips onto the screws and viola!! My 'lil house phone came alive with a dial tone! *Alleluia* I could talk to my Darling for hours!! hehehehe...
Those were the days eh? Such simple pleasures!! :)
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