So I was “that guy” last night, brought the Home Depot rental truck over to Lowe’s to pick up the tub and surround. A couple months ago, we had picked out what we wanted to put in our bathroom on Home Depot’s website. I added the surround and tub to my wishlist (in case someone changed their minds and I could get exactly what we wanted). A couple weeks ago I decided it was time to get things ordered and I went to put the tub, surround, and a bathroom fan in my cart… only to find out the tub was no longer available through Home Depot… really?

I went to Sterling’s website and found out Lowe’s is also a distributor and had what we needed. So I ordered the fan from Home Depot and the tub and surround from Lowe’s. When ordering online, Lowe’s gave me an estimated delivery date of 3/29/2013. They also had me fill out delivery directions and pay a delivery fee (which I totally forgot about when I went in to pick it up). I get a call from Lowe’s saying my order was in and I could pick it up anytime…

After a little internet searching, I found out that some Lowe’s have rental trucks available; I called this Lowe’s and apparently they do not. I thought, alright, Home Depot is across the street, I’ll grab their truck and head over. After signing the rental agreement I head in to Lowe’s…

Apparently when the guy who called me said I could pick it up anytime… didn’t really mean anytime… I guess everyone that could bring my order up front was on lunch break. I must have waited 20-30 minutes before it was ready to be loaded on the truck. In the meantime I was asked to sign a ticket when I realized I had paid for a delivery and gave delivery instructions. The person behind the counter was like, whoa you did pay for delivery… -.-

After getting refunded the delivery charges (which was a lot more than the truck rental), I pulled over to the lumber area and they loaded everything on to the truck with a forklift. The tub was standing straight up and the surround was packaged next to it… both secured in a wooden crate. After they put it on the truck, the guys from Lowe’s said “thanks” and took off. Not sure if they thought since it was so heavy it wouldn’t be a problem, but I decided I better run in to get a strap to tie it down… glad I did as it did move around a bit on the bumpy Michigan roads!

…and I was the only one to show up. Oh well, managed to get in seven miles on my hybrid. Some how I was able to average ten mph going into the 25 mph wind, with gusts up to 38 mph. I was pretty toasty this ride with my new gloves, skull cap, and shoe covers. Even though it was in the mid-twenties, I was still sweating, guess I didn’t need the skull cap after all. 😛

…and I was dropped in the first couple miles. It was a cold and windy day and I wasn’t really sure what to expect when I showed up for my first group ride. A couple guys set out on their mountain bikes while I waited for the other group to get set (apparently the “A” group). Once everyone was ready, we were off and at a blistering pace. I held on at 20+ MPH for a little over two miles and finally fell off the back. Luckily I was able to catch up to the mountain bike duo (after missing a turn and turning around) and had a nice 18 mile ride at a decent pace. By the time we got back, my hands were cold and my feet where numb, but it was a lot of fun and I can’t wait for next weeks ride (unless its snowing again!)

The house remodeling project is coming along. The walls are framed and electrical is slowing getting in place. Monday night I ordered the doors and picked up a few dry wall tools. Since I was heading to Home Depot to order the doors, I figured I would order the tools online and they would be ready to be picked up when I got there (or so I thought). The door ordering process took a lot longer than I thought, being a software guy I saw how inefficient the ordering process was and how I would’ve changed it to make it a smoother, faster process. Once the doors were ordered, I headed over to the customer service desk to get my tools. Apparently the e-mail indicating the tools were ready to be picked up was not really true. The lady at the desk called someone over who went to go get what I ordered. I paid for the doors, updated my home address, and waited for the guy to return.

I waited a few minutes and then a few more, I got an e-mail asking to fill out a survey for how the order pick-up process was. Five minutes later I decided to fill it out and give some pretty poor scores. Ten minutes later I got up and started pacing, wondering what was taking so long. I heard the customer service lady call the guy on the phone and she said he should be coming along soon. After another ten minutes I decided to give him a few more minutes and I would be returning my items. Finally, I saw him coming out of an aisle, with a shopping cart with the four items I ordered in it. What is the point of having an in-store pick-up if I could get the items five times faster than the guy who got them?

Susan and I spent this past weekend at a bed and breakfast in Allegan. It was a little tricky getting there as the GPSs didn’t quite get us to the right location, but we eventually found it and had a really good time. It was a little cold, but we made our way over to downtown Holland to have a look around. The breakfast was good, and I wouldn’t mind going back for a nice, relaxing weekend. We even made it back in time so I could put a new garage door opener in…

A couple months back my garage door opener wasn’t working and I determined the drive gear needed replacing. I headed over to an over head garage door place and picked up a kit and had it installed in less than an hour. Everything was working again! Last week, the other opener was doing the same thing. Figuring it was the drive gear, I picked up a new one, installed it, and… the opener decided to shear it in a matter of minutes. That opener wasn’t much to speak of and apparently openers only have a life expectancy of ten years…

I had read it takes on average five hours for a novice to install an opener. I managed to get it installed in less time then that and with out too much trouble. I was hoping to re-use the safety eyes and wall push button of the old one, but eventually ended up replacing them. Unfortunately we didn’t get the extender brackets for the safety eyes, so I used the old ones… It works, but the lights are facing the bracket and it was a bit tricky to see if the beam was making it across. Everything seems to be in good working condition, hopefully I won’t have to replace the mine anytime soon!