Florentino The Cable Guy

A day at the Haskell household is not without drama, and today is no exception.
About 2 weeks ago, we ordered cable everything--extended basic cable, cable phone, and of course cable internet. We decided that having a combined bill for all services, as well as paying less, was a deal we couldn't refuse. The only hangup at the time was that we would have to wait to have the cable phone installed--today was the day for that.
The phone rang at 10am, and a man from the cable company said he'd be here in about 10 minutes. When he arrived, he rang the doorbell. Little did he know that he had just awakened Caroline and interrupted some heavy sewing. :) His last name was Florentino, so I will refer to him as such. He asked to go upstairs to where the cable box for the internet was. No problem, right? Hmmmm.....
So the upstairs was a wreck. I began to furiously clean while he inspected the cable box behind our extremely heavy dresser. After breaking a sweat by helping him move it, I continued to clean, change diapers/clothing, and tell Christian to stay out of Florentino's tool bag. Just when I thought I had it all under control, he asked if we had an attic.
Oh for the love of Pete!
What we have is an "access" to the attic, not a true one since it's a 2 story--or at least that's what the realtor and inspector told us. He needed to see it anyway, and he also needed a ladder. Somehow, going downstairs and fetching mine saved him 10 steps to his truck to get his. Whatever.
Florentino came back with my ladder (let me interject that he was about 3 inches shorter than me and had already given me a complex), attempted to look, and realized it was too short--or he was too short--whatever the case was. He was then off to his truck to fetch his ladder...which was also too short...so he had to go back AGAIN and get the tall ladder...sheesh!! He came out of the messy closet (I'm almost certain he saw the horendous pile of laundry) and began to tell me that I indeed have a nice-sized attic...and someone else's crap was stored up there. Get this: the ORIGINAL owners left about 5 boxes!!! I crawled up there and discovered a box of t-shirts, boxes of bank statements/used up checkbooks, yearbooks and college stuff, etc. It was truly amazing!
By this time, Florentino was trying to tell me that he would have to switch out my phones--the one downstairs with the answering machine would have to sit on the dresser and the little one in the bedroom would have to go downstairs.
Ummmm, no. Not happening. My dresser is NOT for stuff like that! :)
He decided that since I had a sour look on my face, he'd try another route. He got up in the attic and attempted to drop a cable down the wall behind the dresser--only after he'd punched a nice-sized hole in my wall. After 30 minutes of me helping him try to locate it in the wall with a little stick that had a magnet on the end (I'm leaving it at that, ok) he had it and was finally in the installation process. All the while, he was saying that he'd wished he'd kept his big mouth shut and just MADE me do the phone switcharoo.
Not happening dude!
Florentino finally finished the installation, and I was downstairs making grilled cheese sandwiches for Christian and Caroline. It was 12pm. He came into the kitchen and proceeded to tell me that he had lost the backup battery to the cable box--and he "assumed" Christian had swiped it and it was somewhere upstairs.
Man, are you kidding me?!?
We tore the upstairs apart, and it looked worse than it had before I furiously cleaned. No battery. I told him to forget it, and he went to his truck to see if he had a spare. 10 minutes later, he came back with the stupid battery--it had fallen in the yard when he brought the box in. Oy!
The funniest part of the visit was when he showed me the battery and jokingly said, "Man, what a day this is going to be! I thought this job would take like 30 minutes, but NNNOOOO. Heck, right now I could be in an alley somewhere relaxing."
So that's what they do when they are supposed to be busy!
Needless to say, I signed the papers he had and gave him a swift kick in the rear as he walked out the door---ok, maybe not a kick, but I really wanted to! :)