Iron, Rookie, Shitty Service
So the game plan for our Saturday was to drop off the Camry for service at the dealership at 11 am and then head up to the huge Coconut Point shopping area to walk around and watch Iron Man. My buddy at work told me the theater there was very nice. So we dropped the car off and told them we would be back around 5. The car needed an oil change plus I had them looking at a couple other issues. The Camry had an alignment problem since day one. At our first 5000 mile service they said they aligned it. Well over time the one tire has become unevenly worn which has caused it to generate an excessive amount of road noise on smooth roads. It almost sounds like I am driving a monster truck at times. We also have had a long term issue with dash console making all sorts of squeaking noises. Since we have approximately 10k left on the factory warranty I wanted to get these things addressed.
So we drive up to this new shopping megaplex. SW Florida is jammed with shopping and dining. America’s unabashed consumerism is on display everywhere you turn. Ali had been to this place with my mom once before, I never was there. Well it is indeed huge. The stores sprawl as far as you can see. Some of it is a different sort of layout, kind of reminding me of downtown disney. The stores are on the first floor and the 2nd and third floors are office space, office space that for the most part seemed to be vacant. Everything was done in a very typical, high end Florida decor. It was very nice to look at. However the first thing I noticed after appreciating the sheer size of the place was that it was dead. There was hardly anyone there. Now maybe it was the time of day we were there, a little before noon on a Saturday. However it looked like a ghost town with only a few people wandering about. Maybe it was more people than I realized but since the area is so big it spread them out, I dunno. Well we were seeing an early movie. We found the movie theater which was also huge and fancy. We bought our tickets but then had about 45 minutes till the flick. So instead of eating the various overpriced junk food items the theater sold we instead went next door and ate a quick lunch at Johnny Rocket’s. Our server was some young Russian looking/sounding kid. It was sort of bizarre.
So we head back to the theater. Ali goes in and gets us a seat in case it is full while I use the bathroom. I come into the theater and laugh to myself. The place is MASSIVE with stadium seating. However it is practically empty. I could count the people without moving to my toes. Ali picked out seats near the top, where we normally choose to sit. However this theater was so big that we actually moved down a full section. The seats were comfortable and reclined some what. It was a Muvico theater, a chain I never visited before.
Before Iron Man started I found myself getting annoyed at what the movie experience has become, commercials. It used to be that was one of the perks of going to the movies was no commercials. Similar to when you buy premium channels on cable, movies were devoid of annoying advertising since you were paying a decent chunk of change to view them. Well no more. Besides sitting through at least 15 minutes of previews we also had to watch at least another 5 minutes of commercials, annoying.
I had been really looking forward to seeing Iron Man. (slight spoiler in here if you didn’t see it) I had very high expectations due to the huge numbers it had been doing along with various glowing reviews I had heard. Perhaps the hype had blown my expectations out of proportion. I liked the film, I wasn’t blown away by it. Ali said she thought the film was good and was surprised when I said I was a little disappointed. It was hard to put my finger on exactly what went wrong for me at the time. I think it comes down to the way it all winds up and the improbability of it. The idea that Tony Stark spent months and months figuring out exactly how to be Iron Man, how to build the suit, how to use it, how to fly and then Jeff Bridges comes along and is able to just jump in a suit and do it all like it was nothing, sort of was where it lost me. That and Gweneth Paltrow saving the day was sort of silly. Still the movie was good over all. Robert Downey Jr was a perfect cast for Tony Stark. The special effects and action are all top notch. We even sat through the entire credits to see the little blurb about the next film. (everyone else in the theater had left, even the cleaning crew) I was sort of pissed to see Samuel L Jackson was involved in the next film. I am so f’ing sick of seeing his face in every other movie I watch. So anyway I would give Iron Man an A- which is a fine rating. Although I have to admit I was almost assuming it would be in the A+ category with the likes of 300.
After the flick we had more time to kill so we walked the complex for quite a while. We were looking for something specific, either a media storage thing for some of our stuff or a bakers rack kind of thing to put across from the kitchen. We went in a ton of stores looking for such a thing, at least 8 or 9 and we struck out each time. By the time we left Best Buy I had about enough of the walking. It was hot and muggy and the truck was parked what seemed to be at least a mile away. I don’t really know how you could do lots of shopping there. Carrying the bags would get to be a major pain in the ass.
So we headed back towards the truck. We stopped and grabbed a smoothie to help cool us off. I told Ali that Coconut Point was nice and all but I had no compelling reason to come back. Well the theater was pretty neat, maybe I would see another film there. But other than that, all the stores we went into are available in several places closer to us. It wasn’t like the place was an outlet of any sort either, there were no deals to be had. Walk forever to pay normal retail prices? No thanks.
We finally found the truck and headed back the dealership. We got there a bit early, around 4:30 even with stopping at a furniture store on the return trip. However I figured it wasn’t an issue since they had the car for five and a half hours by that point. Well as we turned the corner into the service lane I just saw the Camry being driven around the corner…. WTF they were just looking at it now? Our service advisor, a big, blonde woman with a lot of tattoos yells out to us that it isn’t ready yet. I didn’t blurt out “I guess not, you just took it back now…” like I wanted to. This woman rubbed me the wrong way when we dropped the car off. When I described the problems she would look at me with a look like I didn’t know what I was talking about and then repeat what I said, maintaining the stupid look. Anyway we said we could run some more errands and would be back.
We went down to Home Goods, the sales lady at the furniture store we stopped at said that they may have something we could use. We did find a cabinet/shelf sort of thing but it was a bit smaller than we wanted and it wasn’t all that great of a deal. There was another furniture store next door so we swung in there just for the hell of it. They actually had something that I thought was the nicest we found so far. Ali thought it was cool too but she wasn’t totally convinced. It wasn’t that expensive either which I liked. We weren’t ready to commit yet though as we wanted to take some measurements at home to see how it would fit.
We got a call from our service advisor that the car was now done so we headed back to the dealership. We see her as we walk up and she says all the paperwork was inside. Well I knew if they only had the car in the shop for 45 minutes they didn’t address my concerns. When I saw the service order my fears were confirmed. They changed the oil, said the tires were within spec and “lubricated the hinge” on the console. So they basically changed the oil and shot the console hinge with wd-40. I was annoyed.
As we walked out I was grumbling to Ali how they really didn’t do anything besides change the oil. It was only 15 minutes till they closed so I knew there would be no resolution that would occur on that day. I was debating if I wanted to just not say anything and then call them back when I confirmed that nothing was fixed or if I wanted to address it now, face to face. At first I picked the former, I started walking towards my truck. Then I change my mind. I turn around and track down our annoying service advisor.
I call her over and ask her if I could talk to her for a second. She came over with a look on her face like she was acting surprised I needed something else but really knew what I was going to say. I told her that basically all that was done was an oil change and nothing else. I told her they didn’t address the other two issues at all. I said that the car was there all afternoon, I was upset that they didn’t do anything until right before we were supposed to come back.
Again she starts with the stupid faces of surprise that I had a complaint. I told her that greasing the hinge of the console would not fix the problem. I told her we had them work on the problem once before and at that time they disassembled the console and added some foam. I said that if she would look at the car service history she would know that greasing a hinge would do nothing. Then I had to rehash the whole alignment deal. I told her at a minimum I expected them to realign the car so the tire I have in the front does not wear unevenly as the other one that causes all of the road noise. Just like when I dropped it off, I told her the alignment had been off since day 1 and that it was aligned at our first service at 5000 miles. Well she could tell I was about to go crazy on her. She called out the shop foreman.
I actually think I dealt with Ron the shop foreman years ago when I was having the maddening squeal issue on my Tacoma. I had to give another quick recap to Ron of the background of my gripes. He went around and looked at all four tires and confirmed that the one was worn more unevenly than the others. When he saw in the service history that an alignment was done at 5000 miles and the console squeak was attempted to be fixed before he took responsibility for the problems, unlike our service advisor. He said we should bring it back and they would do an alignment free of charge and also would be willing to work out some sort of deal on tire replacement since they normally cost $150 each. He also said they would once again work on the console squeak issue. He did a good job of defusing the anger I was feeling. So the new plan was for me to bring it back first thing next Saturday so they can actually try to do something about the problems instead of simple acting like they are.
We didn’t get home until around 6:30. Originally I had mentioned the possibility of heading right outside and getting the mowing and weed whacking done so it was one less thing to do on the list which was still long since we were out most of the day. However by the time I got home, the shopping, walking, fruitless furniture browsing and car dealership bullshit had sucked any and all motivation from me. Instead we relaxed and watched Tivo, f it.
Sunday morning was go time. The weekend chore list had hardly been touched so I got to work early. But before doing so I decided to hop on the treadmill and run a couple miles. I have not run much at all in the last month or so due to my knees feeling iffy. It went pretty well though. I ran at a moderate 9:13 pace. After running and getting the pool cleaner going I went out and changed the oil on the Tacoma and picked up stuff around the house in preparation for mowing and weed whacking. Then Ali jumped on the mower while I did battle with the considerable amounts of trimming to be done. We busted it out and finished outside before lunch. After lunch there was more to do like cleaning the bathrooms, dusting and sweeping with the Dyson. We quickly did our May cleaning project by pulling the living room furniture away from the walls and cleaning behind/under all of it. We had everything knocked out by about 3, not bad.
The rest of the day was pretty laid back. I watched the some of the Flyers getting crushed in HD as well as some of the Celtics/Cavs game. I also got to watch my first HD episode of Battlestar Galactica in HD, pretty sweet. Sunday night we watched The Rookie.
The Rookie is based on a true story of a guy in his mid 30’s that resurrected his failed baseball career that he pursued when he was younger. The movie is 6 years old, I’m surprised I hadn’t seen it before since I am a sucker for feel good baseball movies. Dennis Quaid is the star of the movie. Based on his age which I guessed to be in his mid 40’s, I assumed Jimmy Morris was older than the 35 he turned out to be. In a nutshell somehow the guy discovers that after having arm problems and only being able to pitch in the mid-80’s in his youth, he somehow managed to throw 98 miles an hour 10 years later. He gets signed by the Devil Rays and makes it to the big leagues. It was a feel good story for sure, although after the movie I quickly investigated the real story and saw that his stats did not reflect his depiction in the movie where he was portrayed as basically unhittable. He only lasted in the big leagues for a few months total, the end of the 99 season and the beginning of the 2K season before arm problems once again shut the door on his baseball career.
The movie didn’t match up with my all-time favorite baseball movie, The Natural, which makes me cry pretty much every time. I’d rate The Rookie behind Field of Dreams as well but not all that far behind. However since I would rate both of those other films strong A’s, that means I’d give this film a B+ or A-. Definitely worth seeing even if you don’t care for baseball.
Of course a film like this immediately connects to my baseball filled youth where I did nothing but dream of playing in the major leagues. I thought how awesome it would be for me to get a chance to play again at the ripe old age of 40. 
The movie did inspire me enough to go into the old toy chest and pull out my first and most loved baseball glove, a roughly 30 year old Wilson. It is an infielder’s glove with Dave Cash’s signature burned into it. I always thought it was funny that Dave Cash had a glove endorsement deal although when I look back at his stats he had a few years where he hit .300, not bad. My glove is beat up as hell but I still love it. I also pulled out one of my soft sided baseballs. It is the size of a real baseball and close to a real baseball in weight but it’s soft enough to throw against a wall and not damage it. With both in hand I walked by Ali and told her I was going to go outside to see if I could still throw. She smiled and followed me outside with Nicki in tow.
As I mentioned above and surely in other blog entries I used to be all about baseball. As I was warming up against the wall I told Ali about some of my childhood baseball memories. I told her how I spray painted a strike zone on the side of the barn and used to throw against it to improve my accuracy. My brother and I also built a lean to thing that we used in wiffle ball games. It had a rectangular opening that was roughly the size of a strike zone and had a net hanging from the back to catch the balls. In my early 20’s when I was contemplating reigniting my baseball career after contacting one of the Blue Jays scouts that scouted me in high school, I made a more complex training aid. It sort of looked like an elevated rabbit pen with one side open. Inside of the box I had a towel hanging down to deaden the ball. The idea was I would throw into the box and then the ball would drop out the bottom and roll back to me. I spent a lot of time and effort on this box but it never worked very well. I wasn’t accurate enough to hit the opening consistently resulting in me having to chase down all of the missed throws. The balls I got into the box often bounced around and out, again not saving me any time.
So anyway as I was telling Ali these stories I was slowly throwing a bit harder against the side of the house. Ali was afraid I would crack the wall but I assured her the soft sided ball would be safe. Nicki liked me throwing against the wall, she would try to grab the ball as it rebounded. Then I was ready to try to throw a few hard ones. I haven’t tried to throw a baseball hard for a good 15 years or so. The most throwing I do is when we throw a football around before a volleyball tournament and that motion is a lot different than throwing a baseball. So I wound up and let my arm snap forward. The ball made a satisfying THUMP as it smashed off the wall and came back to me. The sound echoed off our neighbor’s house. Wow that didn’t feel too bad. I retrieved the ball and snapped off a few more what felt to be pretty hard throws. I have no idea how fast they were, all I know is that it felt good to throw.
To throw hard overhand requires a lot of fast twitch muscle action as well as putting large amounts of strain on the shoulder and elbow joints. Considering the problems I have with my joints, I was surprised I would be able to throw with any authority at all. After about a half dozen hard ones I didn’t want to push my luck. I wished I had my brother around so he could kneel down and catch a few full speed throws. Ali threw around with me a bit as the sun was going down. It was fun. I’m surprised my arm doesn’t hurt today. It would be fun to be able to throw a few off a mound to a catcher with a real catcher’s mitt just to see if I still can generate that same sweet WHAP when a hard fastball hits the mitt in the sweet spot. Nothing used to make me feel prouder than to have someone drop the glove and shake his hand in pain after catching a fastball.
It feels like I have a ton of things I am monitoring to make sure they get taken care of. I have the Scooba and Automatic Litterbox still out and waiting replacement. I have to make sure the pool cage guy follows through on closing out his permit and then in turn make sure the pool builder closes out his. I have to make sure Toyota handles the issues with the Camry. I’m in the middle of trying to get the shitty pool drain covers returned which is proving to be a hassle. I need to get the van in the shop so they can finally complete the recall work. There are a handful of other things that are not popping into my mind right this moment. It just feels like I have a lot of rods in the fire at once.