We expect things to stay the same (or, how my garage door got broken)

So, this is how my garage door got broken,

My house is for sale (this is not a secret). It has a two-car garage. I always park in said garage, and I have a remote in my car. I always use the remote, usually engaging it when I turn into the circle where I live. I love seeing the garage door lift up at my command from as far away as possible.

So imagine my surprise one day last week when the garage door does not automatically go up. Oh, it tries to all right. It goes up part-way on one side, for about one foot. I see something is wrong and immediately press the opener again to stop it, and press again to make it go down. It kind of goes down.

I let myself in using the front door. My house had been shown that afternoon so thankfully I hadn't locked the deadbolt because my key doesn't work on the deadbolt; only the doorknob was locked so the realtor could get in using the key in the lock-box, which works fine.

I make my way to the attached garage, and see dust and a rock (turned out to be a calcified hornet's nest, small fist-sized) on the floor, a few bolts and one of the rolling-thingies too.

Very long story short, my son-in-law came over, tried to fix it, he couldn't. The frame is all out of sorts, on both sides. Bolts from both sides were shot out and also from the ceiling part. He got them back in, but couldn't pound the frame back into place.

He said what happened was that someone turned the t-handle (manual thing) and locked it. So that when I tried to raise the garage door remotely, it couldn't go up. Well, it TRIED but it was like Samson pushing at the pillars.

So I knew that ~I~ didn't touch the t-handle. I never touch the t-handle. I called my realtor, left him a message, and it turns out the potential buyer, when leaving, had thought he'd seen a gap near the garage door bottom (it is not a gap, but there is some cement missing on the driveway near the garage door). So I guess he turned the t-handle thinking it would make the garage door meet the driveway?? Which really wasn't the issue and really wasn't HIS issue to try to fix.

And then along I come be-bopping home, assuming everything was just as I had left it that morning. Clicking my remote, and of course, garage door disaster ensued.

I know you shouldn't "assume" anything, but in my own home, I am KING (er, QUEEN). We expect A to always be A, tuna to always taste like tuna, and the garage door to always open in the same fashion.

We do not expect strangers to put their cotton-pickin' hands on our stuff and break them.

So my first post is a complaint - and I'm not at nature a complainer, but since this just happened today, here it is.

The company shall remain nameless but it has to do with garage doors over your head.

I had made an appointment to have someone come take a look at my damaged garage door (how it got damaged shall be a post for another day!). The window they gave me was between 11 and 2, and the tech would call me when he was in my area within that time.

I decided to take today off from work as I didn't want to go in for just a couple of hours in the morning nor go back to work for a couple of hours in the afternoon. No biggie. I've spent it pretty much how I wanted, drinking coffee, reading, relaxing, tidying up around the house. From shortly before 11 until 2, I made sure my phone was never out of my hand. When it rang, I answered it (neither time was it garage tech).

I kept checking the phone to make sure I had no missed calls, as that can happen - however, no missed calls. I had skipped lunch as I had no food in the house to make lunch; well, nothing I wanted to make, and I'd planned to treat myself to lunch out, once they'd come and left. So by 2 I was irritated that they had not shown up yet, AND hungry.

So I called them, and gave them my appointment confirmation number. They transferred me to dispatch. They said that "Charles" was running late, and on another call, and it would be 3 or 4 before he was in town (!). Go ahead to lunch, they said, and he would call when he was nearby.

OK, not a big deal, so I went to McDonald's (yep, really treated myself) and got home by 3.

At 3:30, Garage company called asking if they could reschedule for same time tomorrow, "Charles" was really behind, they had 2 broken down trucks and no one else in the area. I said I could not as I'd taken today off especially for this appointment. How about tomorrow evening, they asked. I could do that, if they could give me a specific appointment, not a time frame. He said no, he could only give me a time range (6-8:30). I felt this was not something I could do - unless I could have a specific time, then the deal was off the table.

I mean, if they blew off today's appointment without calling me within the appointed time (I ended up calling them if you'll recall), then what's to say they wouldn't blow off tomorrow's appointment? I understand they probably can't give a specific time but the way I was feeling, they OWED me a specific appointment, because of THEIR failure.

• They owed me for the time I'd spent waiting for them to come
• They owed me for the time I'd spent worrying if I'd missed their call
• They owed me because they didn't keep their promise
• They owed me for not calling to tell me they were running late
• They owed me for not offering to work with me - "if you'll let us re-schedule, we'll waive the $19 fee because this was our mistake"
• They owed me because I kept my promise and waited for them

(I'll say it for you - entitled much? Well, I believe my time is valuable, so in this case, yes.

So, since there are other garage door companies around, one of those other companies will get my business.