I’m not up to setting up an actual poll but I’d like input on this. IMO this has got to peg 11 on the dumber than shit meter.
One of our vehicles needed an oil change. It also needed to be check out because some of the warning lights where coming on now and then (thats a whole nuther thread of abject stupidity).
So the SO takes it into the dealer this morning. After a few hours I get the call to come get her because they need to fix a few things. So far so good.
They tell her it will be ready sometime between 3 and 4. Also fine.
Now, we don’t give a rats ass whether its ready this afternoon, the next morning, or next week for that matter. Just fix what needs fixing and we will be happy.
So, 3 ish rolls around. The SO tells me to just drop her off at the dealer and when its done she will drive it home.
I tell her that she needs to call and ask if the car will ACTUALLY be ready today. Yes… the people there SAID it would be…but you know…shit happens and stuff.
But NOOOOOO… calling them would be a sin against the fucking Pope or some such.
So, at end of day rush hour I spend 20 minutes driving the SO to the dealer to go pick up the car.
Also fine.
Now here is the fucking kicker.
She wants me to WAIT to make sure the car will actually be ready.
Jezzus fracking Christ.
Good fucking thing it was. Or somebody would have been taking a taxi home.
She’d had time to think it over, and decided you were right. You win moral points by not crowing, “Told ya so!” She wins moral points by following your advice (although in an indirect fashion.)
Seriously, I see it her way. Calling the shop is a (minor) imposition on them. It interrupts their ability actually to get work done on cars. Don’t you hate it, at your workplace, when people call all the time and ask, “Will it be done on time?” Don’t you ever want to growl, “Well, it would be, if you didn’t call me every five minutes!”
So, she wanted to avoid that degree of rudeness. Instead, she feels comfortable imposing on you, because you’re family and friend and lover and she knows you’ll forgive her. She doesn’t feel comfortable with the shop guy.
Also… The time you lost waiting for her is probably about the same as the time it would have taken to call.
No, this is one of those things you just grin and bear. She’ll do the same for you someday.
Believe me, you do stuff she finds every bit as incomprehensible!
Yes, except that she then went to the shop, in person, and asked “is my car ready”; which is exactly the same question she would have asked over the phone. It was going to be the same interruption one way or the other. It didn’t save any inconvenience for the shop for her to go there in person.
However, billfish, it was 20 minutes to get there, and another 20 home. If it hadn’t been ready, you’d be out 40 minutes. That ain’t no 11 on any dumber-than-shit meter I ever seen.
Sure, but the 40 minute round trip drive to the shop would have been a total waste if the car were not ready. They lucked out this time, but it was a rather stupid gamble to take.
Calling the shop once near the expected completion time is quite reasonable as well as wise, and is not any imposition to speak of. Calling eleventy times throughout the day is something else again.
There’s really no good reason not to have called before making the drive.
Maybe I just got lucky, but the shop that works on our cars has a service manager whose job includes answering the phone and talking to customers about what’s going with their cars. He’ll call us if something comes up, he’ll call us when the car is ready, and he answers when we call and ask what the status of our vehicle is. It has no effect on what happens on the shop floor, beyond a possible “Hey, Joe, how much longer on that Scion?” yelled across the bay. It’s not a huge shop, either - maybe 4 or 5 guys total, including the manager.
Bottom line, unless they call me, I always call them to be sure my car is ready, even tho it’s just 5 miles from home.
Potentially wasting 40 minutes of a spouse’s time because she feels 45 seconds of a professional mechanic’s time is worth too much to intrude upon says a lot about how she values her spouse’s time. It would be different if, just before asking him to wait, she had admitted that he was right, she should have called first. But without that admission of error, it appears that asking him to wait was just part of her original plan.
If we have a car at the shop, we’re not going there to pick it up unless we have confirmation that it’s ready (either they call us or we call them).
Agreed though that it’s not quite 11 on the DTS meter. Hopefully you can move past this terrifying rip in the space-time continuum and get on with your marriage. As Becky2844 suggests, you can make the call yourself if your wife refuses to do so in the future.
I thought this was going to be a complaint about the garage. You’re actually complaining about your wife over something so trivial, and asking us if she’s dumber than shit? Dude man, you’re holding on way too tight.
Agreed, on a scale of 1 to 11111!!!eleventy DTS meter, this rates as a “just let it go.” If you let this very minor thing ruin your marriage, then you’ve scored an 11111!!!eleventy on your DTS meter.
Try to remember some of the things that you love about your wife.
Can the church say amen? I don’t see why the OP took on the risk of being inconvenienced when he could have just as easily placed the call himself. Instead, he threw his hands up in the air helplessly when he wife refused to do so and then came here to bitch about how dumb she’d been even though everything worked out anyway.
she already spent hours waiting for the car and now it’s your turn to spend some time on it.
you at the car shop and you don’t want to spend 20 minutes driving home in rush hour. i call that an opportunity. you got a hobby, then go to a store and buy something for that hobby.
