Changing an address on an #Amazon #order

             I ordered the Felix Mendelssohn String Quartet No. 2 in A Minor from Amazon.com today because we loved the performance of this piece by the #Shanghai #Quartet at the #Chamber #Music festival in the St. Francis Auditorium a few days earlier.            
         Everything went well, I made it an Instant Order on #Amazon, clicked on that and then opened it to check that it had the right delivery address.  Alas, it was scheduled to go to Palm Desert.           
         When I tried to change the address, my computer screen went bonkers, with Amazon.Com blocking anything on the screen.  Eventually, I went to Google, entered “Amazon phone contact” and got a site for Customer Service Numbers, which guaranteed that, if I dialed 1 – 900 226 – 5170 (at a cost of $2), I would be given the number I wanted.                                                                              
         When I dialed the number I was given (1 – 800 777 – 0133) I was given the California Department  of Motor Vehicles.  I later learned by looking further down on Google, that the correct service number to call was 1 – 800 – 201 7575.                                      When I told the helpful woman with the tinkling laugh about being sent to Motor Vehicles and how lucky Amazon was that I wasn’t sent to a porno sight, she apologized for the inconvenience (but not the $2) and changed the delivery address.

#Kay #Ballard Eats #Turkey Meatloaf

       El Mitote, Santa Fe New Mexican, August 7, 2011: “Singer Kay Ballard, visiting Santa Fe for the first time, was seen last Saturday buying turkey meatloaf at the Whole Foods deli counter.  She was looking lovely as ever…”                          

          I say lets have a forever moratorium of sightings of any celebrities while they are shopping for turkey meat loaf.  There are lots of things I do not have to know about celebrities and when they buy their turkey meatloaf ranks high in my TMI (Too Much Information) scale.                         

         Furthermore, writing that she looked lovely while buying turkey meat loaf did not mitigate for one moment that El Mitote reported that she was buying turkey meat loaf.         

        (By the way, this was after Cargill recalled over 36 million tons of ground turkey meat, one of the biggest recalls in U. S. history, because the meat actually killed one person and sent hundreds more to bed in 26 states because of salmonella.  Kay Ballard is either very brave or very unaware.)

#Santa #Fe 16th #Worst #Dressed

                      As noted in the  New Mexican’s El mitote gossip column, July, 2011:   “Santa Fe made another top list – only this one is for being the worst-dressed.  GQ Magazine picked us as the 16^th worst-dressed city in the country, laying some of the blame at the feet of Georgia O’Keefe.

                       Stayton Bonner writes, “Ever since her New Mexico paintings hit Manhattan, New Yorkers have clogged the City Different with New Age lameness and Yankee notions of how the American West should look (and it doesn’t look good.)  As a consequence, modern-day Santa Fe is Western like an Outback Steakhouse is Australian.”  At 16, Santa Fe is ranked between Atlanta (17) and Provo, Utah (15).

             Santa Fe Reporter: Ouch! Santa Fe is 16th Worst-Dressed City in US  GQ's admittedly unprofessional ranking system derides SW-chic By Alexa Schirtzinger

                   I've never been reluctant to criticize such style missteps as Val Kilmer's 
             abhorrently huge bolo tie--but even I can't stand being ridiculed by GQ 
             magazine. “                                 
                    Another local response: “When I discovered that Santa Fe was named number 16 on GQ’s The 40 Worst Dressed Cities in America, I was steamed.   The truth: we’re not so fashionable here.   But, REALLY, “western like an Outback Steakhouse is Australian”? That hurts.                                
         “It’s not so much that we dress badly. In The City Different we dress, well, differently- from you and from each other. As befits a western town, it’s chock full of individuals. Yeah, you see outrageously great and expensive cowboy boots, tall Stetsons, concho belts and amazing silver and turquoise jewelry around town, especially when the big markets bring a lot of visitors in.  
           But, that’s only part of the story. Dress is eclectic in this casual city. You’ll see anything and everything from broomstick skirts to linen pants, from western shirts to Polo.   At the Santa Fe Opera and in some of the high-end restaurants, black tie is sitting next to jeans and they don’t bat an eye, either of them.  We all dress the way we want It’s part of the charm. They just aren’t fashionable and most people probably don’t give a hoot. And ultimately, who cares? But couldn’t GQ have put us on the list and called it a day?                                                                       
        Signed:  And proudly thin skinned.”                               
        COMMENT:   My personal attitude, whenever there is silly criticism and even sillier responses: be proud, never shameful.  Yes, people in Santa Fe dress like escapees from Mad Hatter’s Dude Ranch.  And the tourists, with colorful Bermudas and high, black socks, resemble sculptures criticizing the middle class.                                                                            And we should be proud of that.  Our fashion “errors” set trends in New York and make us look like Chicagoans on vacation.  Yes, we seldom dress up, almost never wear suits (unless we have been recently indited), and can no longer tie a tie because we haven’t worn one since we arrived in Santa Fe.  Be a Santa Fean and be proud!

Norm vs. #RAIL RUNNER service cuts. Norm wins?

Editorial in the Santa Fe New Mexican, 7/10/11:  Train’s expensive, but worth saving was about the Rail Runner from Santa Fe to Albuquerque and Belen.  The paper supported the railroad, which is losing money, and noted that “mass transit is not expected to be a money-maker.”  It also noted that weekend service is about to be cancelled.

         All true, but the Rail Runner has never connected with the Albuquerque airport, a major oversight.  It also stops running at a ridiculous hour, with the last train back to Santa Fe leaving downtown Albuquerque at 6:34 PM, arriving in Santa Fe a little after 8 pm.  This means that it is impossible to go to Albuquerque, have dinner, attend a play and get back to Santa Fe. 

         This seems to be extremely short-sighted planning.  It resulted in a printed letter to the New Mexican in which I suggested that later trains be scheduled and trains on weekends be continued.  No response, except about a week later it was announced that, for the time being, weekend travel would be continued.

#Hot #Tub Wars #2nd round #Santa #Fe: Bring Out Your #Dead

Hot Tub Wars, Round Two:

Bring Out Your Dead

 

   

We used our second hot tub for a few weeks.  Then Rick drained it and shut it down for the winter.  When we returned early the next summer, I called Rick to set it up once again.

When he arrived and removed the side panel so he could have access to the guts of the hot tub, he immediately told us the bad news.  The mice had not only eaten the master control panel, all that was left of it was a dangling, frayed, white wire hanging down from the inside of the spa. 

Me, incredulous, “The actually ate the entire control panel?”

Rick, matter of fact, “They didn’t touch the plastic panel that indicated ‘hi’ or ‘low’ circulation, just all the electronics underneath it.”

Me, more incredulous, “They ate the electronics?”        

When I looked inside at the area behind the small access door, I saw mouse nests and droppings, I noticed that seeds and cactus had been brought inside their enclosure.  The cactus seeds that they moved in to our spa indicated to me that they were doing some interior decorating and would probably soon move in hammocks, perhaps some mousy art objects, all in preparation for a nice long stay.       

We actually found droppings and nests in and on the plastic bags of mothballs that we put in the hot tub to keep them out.

We should have known that the mice would win in the battle of the hot tub when, as we were leaving in the fall, we heard music coming from the hot tub area.  The mice had organized a small marching band and it was playing Souza marches to celebrate our leaving.            

There were so many mice and they were so happy with the homes we provided them in the winter, that they sent us Christmas cards thanking us for the hospitality.  I swear they invited relatives from Arizona and Colorado to join them in their nice apartments and condos inside my hot tub.                       

Once we returned to Santa Fe, before Rick arrived to inspect the hot tub, I would go out every day to check the traps that I had set, baiting them with wonderful tasting Skippy’s chunky peanut butter.  As I walked to the spa, which was inserted in the middle of a deck directly in front of our bedroom windows, I would intone the Medieval chant, “Bring out your dead, bring out your dead.”  Every day I would find one, two, or three bodies of mice.

#hot #tub war in #New #Mexico: #mice winning

Then, he arrived at the appointed time, but said he had to come back in a few days with three other guys, lift up the spa and figure out where the leak is.  Also Rick mentioned that a tub that circulates every 10 minutes or less probably means that the computer control board is malfunctioning, something missed by Tom the Tub Guy.

         After lifting up the hot tub a few days later, Rick offered a bad news/good news assessment: it would take $900 to repair the hot tub, including replacing the computer control board and several rubber pipes, which circulated water and were chewed through by the mice.   The good news was that he had a hot tub that was similar to the one we had, but was already repaired good as new and he would sell it to me for $1,400, delivery of the new one and removal of the old one included. 

         I thought about asking, but did not: the hot tub you are selling to me – is that the one you got from John Berkenfield, then sold back to him and later took it back again?  In other words, are your hot tubs a modern version of the fruit cakes that would be given as Christmas gifts again and again not so many years ago?

         Two days later, with almost the same crew, Rick took away the old hot tub and inserted a slightly smaller, rebuilt one in its place.  He gave me this advice, “Put moth balls around the underside of the deck because mice hate the smell of moth balls.”

         I thought it was worth a try.  I bought nine boxes of mothballs, put them in plastic bags with holes in the bags and distributed the bags around the perimeter of the deck that held the hot tub.  Two days later, when the water was warm enough, Grace and I settled in to our new-ish tub and relaxed.  The only problem was that the entire hot tub area smelled like my grandmother’s sweaters in the fall when she took them out of mothballs.  I wasn’t sure they would repel mice, but I had a strong guarantee that, while we were in the hot tub, all moths would avoid us.

         Rick also said, “Never use poison pellets because, if you do and they work, you’ll be smelling dead mice around your hot tub.”   I should have asked him which aroma was worse: Mickey Mouse or mothballs?  I probably would have voted for the mothballs.   

#Hot #Tub removal: #Mice #Win in #Santa #Fe

After the hot tub was removed, we were then left with a deck with a 64-square-foot hole in the middle of it.  Grace wanted the entire deck taken out.  Eddie LeBow, a former contractor and helper for all seasons (he took the snake out of the house, an adventure to be related in a few pages), said that removing the deck would mean that we’d be sitting so low to the ground that we could no longer enjoy watching the sunsets.  I agreed with him, perhaps because of my tendency never to throw anything away.  At least that was what Grace suspected.

It was one of the rare times when Grace needed a demonstration to prove a point.  I put chairs in the hole that formerly held the hot tub.  We sat in them and, sure enough, the coyote fence obscured most of the view, but especially the sun as it set.  Since sunsets are one of the perpetually enchanting events in the Land of Enchantment, Grace quickly agreed to hire Eddie to replace the boards and eliminate the hole in the deck.

Today, the deck is painted a pale yellow and has a glass-topped table and four chairs, which we bought while shopping at a local super market.  It was the last set that they had, we quickly agreed that it would be perfect on the refurbished deck and the manager of the store suggested that it would be easy for her to deliver the set to us.   Call the table-and-chair set “tchotchkies from the produce section.” 

Found: a note from the #mice in #Hot #Tub Wars #Santa #Fe

After a short discussion, Ortega agreed to haul the hot tub away ($275).  He encouraged us to replace the hot tub with a mouse-proof one, totally encased in metal and tough plastic.   But why didn’t he tell us about this improvement immediately after the mice ate the first hot tub?

He also refused to offer a trade-in on our current tub, saying that it would cost more to fix it than he would get to sell it and he would only be taking it to the dump.

About a week later, Ortega and a four-man crew arrived to remove the hot tub.  When the lifted it up and took it out of the hole in the treated-wood patio, we could see that the mice had constructed several nests, had merrily chewed through a lot of insulation, had left many, many droppings and several of their dead relatives.

We also found little, as-yet-to-be mailed notes to the mouse relatives in Arizona and Nevada: “Having a wonderful time.  Lots to eat, including wire insulation ’07, a particularly good year.  It’s warm, especially if we all huddle together.  Hope you can join us because we are having a GREAAAT time!!”                          

I thought about cleaning up the mess myself until I asked Rick and his brother Ike if that was dangerous.  They advised me that mouse droppings, especially in New Mexico, have been associated with the Plague and the sometimes-fatal Hanta Virus.   So I quickly agree to hire Ike Ortega and his crew to clean the area.                   

They arrived, donned facemasks, and HazMat suits.  Looking like characters from some strange science fiction movie, they began spraying.   So I had two alien guys in HazMat suits breathing through fancy gas masks and sweeping up piles of mouse poop.   Call me a coward if you will, but mention the Plague and the clean up cost, an additional $200, seemed well worth it. 

#Hot #tub wars vs. #mice in #Santa #Fe

Three days after starting the spa pumps, I turned them off and stared at the pool.  The water seemed to be nearly the same depth as when the pumping started.

But we couldn’t get in the hot tub.  Not yet.

First, I had to completely drain of the hot tub and the Fix-a-Leak.  Although I was given no warnings, other than not to get in water with Fix-a-Leak, I feared if any of the chemical touched us, our skin might become sealed, causing our bodies to bloat with perspiration and eventually to either float away or suffer a noxious explosion.   Since I didn’t know what I was doing, such fears were easy to come by and difficult to put aside.  If anyone said, “There, there, you probably won’t explode,” I would instantly ask, “How do you know?  Have you ever met anyone who survived a Fix-a-Leak bath?”  There would be no possible answer.

 After draining, I had to re-fill the hot tub with water.  Hundreds of gallons of water.  And this was the second filling of my hot tub.  How long would this parched community allow me to fill, empty and re-fill my hot tub before I was branded as a water thief or worse?

After the hot tub was re-filled, Grace and I stared at it for several minutes, fully expecting to hear the steady drips of a leak.  But all was quiet.

That night, after the leak was apparently repaired and the water heated to low tepid, we enjoyed the hot tub, noticed the three-quarter moon, saw thousands of stars and had a wonderful romantic time.  The hot tub was fixed and ready to be used.   

  Almost as if on schedule, three days later, the leak had returned.  And I began searching for another spa repairman.   Tom the Tub Guy was a perfect storm of a repairman: almost never showing up when promised, overcharging including an hourly fee for watching water flow into a tub and not fixing the problem. 

  When I spoke of my hot tub frustrations during a dinner party at John and Barbara Berkenfield’s home.  They are a fascinating couple that spent years in Europe with IBM.  John is the guy who revived Rancho de las Golindrinas, a 500-year-old stage and first-day rest stop on the way from Santa Fe to Mexico City in the 16^th Century.  He suggested Rick Ortega, who installed his hot tub and who repaired the hot tub of friends of theirs.

  That sounded like a good recommendation, until John continued.  When he got frustrated with the hot tub he had (because of leaks) and the endless repairs it needed, he gave the tub to Rick if he would just haul it away.  A few years later, John changed his mind, called Rick and purchased another tub, which was rebuilt and refurbished and cost a fourth of what a new one would be.  After it was installed, John realized that he had just bought and had installed the same tub he gave away to Rick a few years ago! 

  When I called Rick, he asked me to fill the hot tub before he got to our house to take a look at it.  This put him well above water when compared to Tom the Tub Guy.

#Mice 2, #Hot Tub Zero in #Santa #Fe

Chapter Six:   Hot Tub Wars

The Score:  Mice 2.  Hot Tub zero

       

     

The hot-tub mice have finally and totally defeated me.   When we bought the El Dorado home, it had a hot tub, a green and dusty gray thing that sat about two feet out of a hole in the industrial gray deck directly in front of the master bedroom’s windows.   It was ugly, especially because it eventually had an ill-fitting greenish, perpetually dusty cover that lapped over the edges of the tub and looked like the youngest child trying to fit into his older brother’s clothing.  

This was the second hot tub we had.  The first could empty itself of water in a little more than three days. 

When the hot tub first took on the qualities of the Titanic on a bad day, I called Tom the Tub Guy, the local hot tub expert.  I was a bit suspicious of him because, when he put the hot tub back in operation after the winter shut down, he spent many hours gazing at the hot tub in philosophical adoration while he waited for a garden hose to fill it up.  He assured me that was the proper and accepted method and that it had nothing to do with adding dozens and perhaps hundreds of dollars to his overall charges.   He also guaranteed that I could not have filled the hot tub before his arrival, thus saving me money and him time or vice versa.

He suggested that I go to the local hot tub supply store and buy Fix-a-Leak, an almost magical potion that could stuff up a leaking hot tub faster than a child flushing a tennis ball or wad of clay into a toilet. 

We certainly enjoyed the tub for the one evening it was warm enough to get in it, which was two days after it was filled for the first time and the night before the leak became all too obvious (unless we wanted to use the tub merely as a foot soaker).  It seemed worthwhile to pour in some Fix-a-Leak to see if it would solve the problem.

When I asked Tom the Tub Guy why the tub was turning itself on every ten minutes or less, he assured me that was normal, that the tub was keeping itself at the desired temperature and the whole process cost less than keeping a light bulb on for a year or two.

I followed the directions exactly, pouring half the Fix-a-Leak container into the tub and then circulating the water on high setting for 72 hours.  We tried to convince ourselves that the sound of the pumps constantly going directly outside our bedroom windows was “almost” the same as listening to a train clickety-clacking through the countryside all night long.   It actually sounded like a dishwasher wheezing all night long.