I haven’t had hot water since Sunday. This has meant boiling a lot of kettles and staying stinky a lot longer than I would normally like. On the plus side, it’s been a great excuse to leave the washing up. But now there’s an accumulation of plates and cups so high and precarious that it really shouldn’t be attempted without the guidance of a sherpa. They don’t have many sherpas in Muswell Hill; there isn’t usually the call for them.
Yesterday (realising the hot water wasn’t going to come back by itself) I called the gas company and quoted my landlord’s repair agreement. It’s a boiler and I’ve been here for 3 years: the thing has broken before. I’ve had to make almost exactly this call at least once annually, so I know how it goes. I’ve kept all the paperwork to prove when they’ve last been and everything.
The gas company surprised me by saying there was no such boiler and no such agreement. “But, the paperwork…” I offered feebly, cartoon stink fumes rising off me as I spoke. Yes, yes, the paperwork. Whatever. I was advised to ask my landlord. I did. He said that he hadn’t cancelled or changed anything since the last callout to this self-same, non-fictitious boiler and would call the company. He did. Then he called me back. I could go ahead and make the appointment as it was a glitch in the company’s matrix and there was a contract and all systems were go. All except my hot water. Still, this felt like progress and eventually I got them to agree to send someone out.
Cut to earlier today, in the hallway of my home, the gas company on the gas man’s mobile and my landlord on mine, both of us having the same conversations. “I was told this.” “Well, I was told that.” Standing in front of the still non-fictitious boiler I was informed, yet again, that it didn’t exist. It had certainly never been worked on by the company. I brought out the company’s own paperwork and pointed at dates and signatures to prove that it wasn’t just a dream I’d had. A really, really boring dream.
The gas man shrugged and started to explain again why he couldn’t work on a ficitious boiler and that he was sorry I didn’t understand… Stinky, tired and really sick of having the same conversation with people who obviously never write anything down or relay information, I snapped. I blew like the fictitious boiler is probably about to do. ”I understand,” I sneered. “Please don’t patronise me.”
I hate rudeness, but I hate it most when it comes from me. The man looked at me like he hated me and to be honest, I wasn’t my own biggest fan at that moment either. He just has to have numbers on a form before he can do things to boilers and the numbers weren’t on the form. That wasn’t his fault. The fact that I’d spoken to his office 3 times the day before and managed to change nothing wasn’t his fault either. But he was there, and I needed him to understand that one of us had been passed the wrong information and it just might be him. All the while, we have no clean plates and people are starting to cross the road when we pass by.
It didn’t give me any pleasure, but maybe now he’ll take me seriously. Maybe now he’ll believe in my boiler. Yeah, right. Whatever.
