I am a woman, but that doesn’t mean I am silly!

The past few months have just been a whirlwind of chaos in my life. My husband and I purchased our very first home, a great condo in downtown Edmonton, and Jon has been in America for the past month attending the Global Village (it’s totally “The Apprentice” but no one gets fired and people are from all over the world). Needless to say, I have been a bit stressed out and ridiculously busy.

The woman that owned the condo previous to me had...interesting….taste. I had to rid myself of the pre-existing living room colors of navy, bright red, tangerine and lemon yellow. It kind of looked like the circus exploded, and that really wasn’t the look I was going for. She also thought the master bedroom would be good lime and navy and that the spare room would be lovely painted purple. It hurt my head. So I painted, and painted and then painted some more – thank goodness I have so many great friends that came to my rescue.

Once I could stand in the living room and not expect Bobo the Clown to come traipsing through, I started on other projects like replacing the plastic (yes, I said plastic) bathroom sinks. Who the heck has plastic sinks? My uncle came over and helped me replace two of the three sinks, the third sink had a huge bow in it, so back to Home Depot it went. While at Home Depot, I decided to pick up a pipe wrench and the other necessary tools so I could replace the third sink all by myself. So I went in search of a customer service person to help me pick out the best pipe wrench possible. I found a short man in the plumbing section and asked for help, it went something like this:

DL: “Hello, I am looking for a pipe wrench, can you tell me where they are?”
Short Home Depot Man: “Uh…you don’t need a pipe wrench.”
DL: “Yup, I sure do. I am replacing a sink.”
Short Home Depot Man: “You’re replacing a sink.”
DL: “YES. Where are the pipe wrenches?”
Short Home Depot Man: “What kind of a sink?”
DL: “A bathroom sink.”
Short Home Depot Man: “Oh, you need a basin wrench.”
DL: “Fine, basin wrench, pipe wrench, the tool for the job – just point me in the direction of the wrenches.”
Short Home Depot Man: “Uh…I will walk you there.”
DL: Upon arrival at the wrench section I exclaimed happily, “Yup! That’s the one I need,” pointing at a pipe wrench.
Short Home Depot Man: “Nope, you need this,” (pointing to crappy looking wrench).
DL: “Uh…no. I have to disconnect the pipe at the bottom of the sink, you can’t do that with that wrench.”
Short Home Depot Man: “I don’t know what the man that is putting this in for you told you, but you don’t need a pipe wrench.”
DL: “Well, first of all I am the one putting the sink in and I do know that I need a pipe wrench.”
Short Home Depot Man: “No, you need this.”

After arguing for quite a long time about the fact that I was indeed the person that was going to be replacing the sink, he insisted on having me draw a diagram of the sink. I then had to explain how to take out and replace the sink.

Short Home Depot Man: “So, show me what you are going to do.”
DL: “Well, after I turn off the water, I am going to remove this pipe and these clamps and take out the sink. I have to tighten the pipes, here, here and here. That ‘basin wrench’ looks like it will break if I use it for that.”
Short Home Depot Man: “So you’re taking the whole sink out?”
DL: “YES! How else the heck am I going to replace the sink? I have to take it out to replace it, don’t I?”
Short Home Depot Man: “So you aren’t just changing the taps?”
DL: “No, the whole thing – the whole kit and caboodle is coming out and everything is going in new.”
Short Home Depot Man: “Oh. So you need a pipe wrench then…”

I about had an aneurysm at this point! Just because I am a girl, it doesn’t mean that I am silly! Just let me purchase what I asked for and send me on my way! For goodness sake!