| I am wondering again how long this baby will last for. My contractions are painful, my lower back is killing me and I'm incredibly emotional at the moment - not sure I trust myself at the moment to deal with situations as they arise. My week has continued downhill. On Tuesday I got into a phone shouting match - this time with a chimney sweep company!! Yep, I'm certainly on my way to ensuring that all bases are covered in terms of my complaints! Our chimney hasn't been working properly, and as the temperature is hitting the lows now, we need it more than ever. The guys were due at 4pm, by 4.30pm there was still no sign of them. The light was fading and the rain was threatening. I telephoned the company and was told the guy had been delayed, so no, he wasn't coming today. Why didn't you call? Was my response. Hadn't considererd it because us 'tenants' never stick to appointments anyway. His ridiculous throwaway comment angered me beyond belief and so I began a tirade of how unprofessional his company was. He hung up on me. Later that night we had a two hour power cut, meaning the oil radiators were out of action. The house was thrust into a cold, dark abyss. The next morning I got onto the Property Manager who had problems with this company already - condemning pretty much every logburner they set their eyes on and charging for sweeps that she was sure the house didn't have an operational chimney anymore! Later on I got a phone call from a woman at the company, supposedly to apologise, but sure enough she made one snide remark too many and again, I took her to china town and back. The incredible thing with companies in NZ is that because there aren't many of any industry, they can hold you to ransom. You literally find yourself having to pick the lesser of two evils. Their customer service is beyond shoddy, they would rather not have your business than apologise. It could be because the country is so young, and there aren't many people, and its not in the Kiwi way to complain, they just suck it up and then bubble about it for all eternity or it could be that during the evolution process Kiwis somehow got stuck in the neanderthal stage. My money is on the latter. End result, someone from the company came and condemned our chimney! There's weather warnings about a cold snap on its way and we have no fire. We have dug out our trusty gas heater though and hope to god there's no more power cuts. Today the college called to say unsurpringsly that the Nanny has made two arrangements to drop our mobile phone off and has still not done so. The other families have continued to find other things missing, which means the police are investigating and statements are being taken. I text the Nanny and told her I would be devastated if she took the phone, not because its worth anything to us, but the principle of her not respecting us enough to steal from us. She text back she had been working, so had not received messages from the college. I doubt it. The college had told me that the police are going to search her current address for other items and they've flown her Father down from Auckland to assist because the Nanny has decided not to help with the investigation. Its possible that the cops may well want to speak with me as my house became a home to stolen items and a psycho bunny boiler. Either way, I feel on the brink of being sucked into something horrible and smelly. I won't know when a cop calls if its to investigate my complaint about an Officer or about the Nanny. Bollocks. I don't recall ever being this tired before and I've had a couple of nightmares recently, nasty ones that make you feel sad all day. I only really get those when the chips are down. Steve of course continues to sleep peacefully next to me. I don't know what it is about this Nanny situation that has bothered me so much. I've travelled, I consider myself streetwise, I know there are some bad apples out there. Perhaps because I've had the fortune not to house any of them before, its not gotten to me. It might be the hormones. Either way I just feel like I'm carrying this overwhelming bag of sadness around. I feel personally betrayed and let down, I feel guilty for not doing a better job in choosing better childcare for my children, I feel like I've been made a fool of. I feel like I've been left without answers. Simply there is nothing much else to do this evening except have a curry and hire a DVD. I'll write this week off for tax purposes I think. |