Apeshit

Husband and I were gifted a new washer and dryer recently. This was cause for celebratory dance moves and toasts and many happy moments, because our old washer leaked like some sort of broken dam and our dryer squealed like I was trying to tumble banshees in its drum.
We desperately needed new appliances.
Husband is a huge researcher when it comes to major (and even minor) purchases, so he decided on a set he thought would work for our family, I looked over the reviews and manuals and agreed, and we were off to the races.
The laundry making magic machines were ordered in mid-December, and we received a shipment time frame of the 27-January 2. I expected, with the holidays screwing up my ability to have clean clothes without a hassle, that they'd be delivered at the far end of the delivery period.
Come January 2, I called the shipping company to find out what time they'd be in the area.
FedEx, if you didn't know, only brings the goodies from Amazon that aren't several hundred pounds.
This day just happened to be the day that the entire northeast was caught in what can only be described as Snowmageddon. The shipping company wasn't going to be making any deliveries for the rest of that week.
While I was frustrated (read: completely fucking livid) that my machines weren't going to be here on time, and my laundry pile was going to continue to get backed up, what really made me go apeshit was the lack of customer service I received.
Getting in touch with a human was difficult enough. When I finally did, her only response was "The weather's bad, we're not coming." I asked her when she thought they might come, and she said she'd look into it and get back to me.
Several hours later, I'd not heard a word. So I called again, and again reached the same person.
This time, I asked to speak to her manager after it became clear she had no desire or interest to help me, with her short, rude New Yorker tones and brusque "The isn't my problem" attitude.
Upon my request, which I felt was warranted and polite, she informed me that the manager was in a meeting, and promptly hung up.
What?!
This person whose only job was to provide customer service had hung up on a customer without providing any sort of service.
I think we've probably all worked jobs where dealing with the public was part of our duty. I certainly have, and while there were definitely times I was mentally throat punching a difficult customer, I was never rude to the damned faces. You know why? Because I needed my frigging job, that's why.
The third time I got through to a human, I spoke with a male customer service rep, who apologized for his coworker's behavior and promised to have the manager, who was actually in a meeting, call me back.
A few hours later, I received a phone call from Mark* who had very few good things to tell me (as in, none, except that he'd be reviewing his employee's tapes and recommending retraining, which is probably a load of horseshit to get the angry woman to shut up).
Apparently, this shipping company only makes runs to my part of the country two days a week- Thursdays and Fridays. So the earliest possible date I would have received my new appliances, barring natural winter weather, was January 2. Which, if you'll recall, was the last possible date I was given.
Why the load had to travel past my house to get to the distribution center was beyond me, and also not part of Mark's jurisdiction, but those were the facts.
When asked why his company didn't inform the seller of their shipping routes so that people could plan accordingly, and not waste an entire week sitting around waiting for a delivery that wasn't ever going to come the same way I waited futilely for John Miller to realize I was the love of his life in 9th grade, Mark had no answers.
Apparently, just like John, who wasn't even aware of my existence, Mark's company was blithely going about its business with no regard for the people who lived with five children and needed to do three loads of laundry a day simply to stay ahead of the piles.
To get back to the point, I was told I'd now be waiting another week before I could even hope to see my delivery.
Except that it was traveling across the northeastern part of the country, where we can reasonably expect winter to last the next eleventy dozen weeks, and there would never be any guarantees that I'd be able to happily do laundry again until spring.
This was enough to make a person go ballistic, but I held on to the tiny thread of composure I had left and resigned myself to never having the mountains of laundry currently heaped in every room of my house finished again.
Then, there was a post-blizzard miracle: the shipping company called on Wednesday to confirm a Friday morning delivery. To compound my everlasting joy, the actual driver called Thursday night, and delivered my shiny new friends in the late evening.
HUsband and I wasted no time hooking them up, and now I'm happily sorting, washing, drying, folding and ironing again like a real adult who has at least some of her shit together.
No leaks, no screaming, and best of all, no more dealing with that particular delivery company.



*Name changed to protect the guilty