My dishwasher broke down this week. I’m not sure why as it is less than a year old. Fortunately, it happened after our houseguests left. In fact, it happened the very same day.

There was a time when I did not care whether I had a dishwasher or not. Hand washing dishes wasn’t a big deal to me. These days, though, I do a fair amount of baking and after being in the kitchen half the day I’m not too keen on washing up. So, now I need to call the department store where we purchased it and go about getting someone to come repair it. Complicated by the fact that we live 20 minutes from the nearest “small” town and an hour from a larger city. And I’m not so sure that in the end someone won’t have to come from the “big city” which is an hour and a half away.

It all begins with a phone call. Therein lies a problem. I loathe talking on the phone the way some people loathe going to the dentist. I’m not fond of going to the dentist either, but it’s a toss-up as to which I like less. Even as a teenager, I wasn’t one of those girls who spent hours on the phone gabbing with my friends. It just seemed too boring.

These days, it’s not that I absolutely don’t talk on the phone, but when possible I’ll use email to communicate and very rarely answer my phone. If I’m home and hear it ring I will immediately listen to messages that are left. For some reason, though, I always need a “heads up” on the subject before engaging in a phone conversation. Leave me a message telling me why you’re calling and 99.9% of the time I will return the call right away.

I suppose I could ask the Big Dog to make the call. Heaven knows he’s made plenty of calls for me when I feel unsure about the subject. Usually something to do with our vehicles or computer hardware. But, this. Well, I’m home all day and he still chooses to go off to work. So it seems a little crazy to ask him to make the call when he comes home for lunch when it should be a fairly simple matter to take care of. Still, here it is three days later and I’m finding all sorts of things to do around the house and places to go that don’t involve speaking to a stranger on the phone. What a freak.

Sad little dishwasher. Maybe kitty wants a bath. Just kidding!