Thread: The book, An introduction

Hmmm... I'll accept it for now, but a closer shot would have been more convincing (but perhaps more terrifying)

PS - Sorry to disappoint you other spectators, but no red hair here! It's just an old nickname that's a play on my real name

Onya Dave.
****s you, doesn't it, when the people responsible for a group switch into holiday mode as well!
Even better when you are up a tree busy chucking kids off, one of them skins a knee and the 'responsible' adult refuses to put a bandaid on because they " don't do blood"!

PS. Wasn't snobbing you the last couple of weeks, phonetrouble during the biggest phone week of the year, so, Merry Merry and a Happy New One to you and Your lovely Family.
Cheers, B Dave.

Great read Dave, I think I've giggled myself into internal bleeding but that's okay.
Keep them coming!

P.S Consider this an expression of interest if this ever becomes a hardcopy

Originally Posted by Disco Muppet

P.S Consider this an expression of interest if this ever becomes a hardcopy

While theres a thread of truth in all of the sections and the names and the descriptions have been altered in the sake of story telling and rant/rave control Its probably not going to proper print till all involved are long dead.

I might put it in the will that its to goto print after my organs are harvested, recipients of the organs get a copy of the book, enough copies to be sold to cover the costs and then it can be released free to the world in E-format. Might even write a decent preface for it.

Heres a multi parter rolled up in one.....

Now my birthday follows up xmas by near enough a month...

Over the Xmas break I was over in perth Fixing on the family cars and I broke dads torque wrench. As part of doing the duty on the cars Id taken over my new shiney Customised kit of snap on socket set, I've always been an advocate of snap on tools and with a lot of help from the people on the forum letting me ply my skills for cash (as opposed to booze which makes the missus happy as whats under our kitchen sink would make an aloholics drunken dreams seem sober) I'd finally skimped and saved enough to kit out a specialised landrover friendly socket set. All the good stuff, wobble drive locking extensions, 80 tooth ratchets, Foamed up and in a tool box. Magic. Even had the top tray foam cut to suit a Snap on torque wrench.

Probably the most common thing heard when we were on the tools on the cars was "Have I told you about how good snap on tools are? They're great" you know the hard to get to bolt on the zf pan in a D2? what used to be 15 minutes of one hand holding the pan faffing with the nuts became a 3 minute job. "Let me tell you about snap-on...." Dad wanted some files and so duly with a minimum of fuss a set of snap on files were ordered and dispatched and surprisingly at not much greater cost that what the same style of file would have cost at bunnings.

at some point it was asked if I wanted anything personal from the family for Xmas (The whole immediate family always gives a bunch of small fun gifts to keep xmas alive for the kids and we'll usually have a big consult to buy something for each person in the family from the whole family Something they need and want (you'll see)) I'd said yes, I need a new torque wrench and dad was sent in to bat for the family to work out what was the best type. "Have you heard about this tool mob, Snap on?" (thats the need + want thing as a mechanic I need to have a torque wrench, I can get by with a sidchorme, kingchrome or one of half a dozen others but what I want Is a Snap on) Negotiations complete get a quote for the torque wrench.

Now Being cheeky and having spent a lot of time harrasing the old man about his grey hair and failing eye sight I decided to have one last cheap shot and lined up a quote for what I consider to be the 3 top of the line snap on torque wrenches, I told the rep that the quote for 3 was really a joke and I'd really only be purchasing the one he was cool with doing up the quote and I presented it to dad.

"yep fine"

Ok, jaw drop and double take... "Dad I think you're eyes are going, thats not $150, its $1500...."

"nope got my reading glasses on, makes sense 1 small one medium and one large torque wrench, just what a mechanic should have"

"Dad, $1500, I cant ask you all to pay that for a practical joke quote, I need this one only..."

"you likely to use em?"

"yeah"

"get the lot"

Urmmm oooh kay, that was unexpected.

I get on the phone to the snap on rep. "I'd like to pay quote xxxxxxxx on credit card yyyyyyyyy"
"Which wrench did you want off of it?"
"All of them"
(stunned silence)
"you there?"
(shuffling of paper)
"Errr yeah, just confirming you want to buy one each of these torque wrenches"
"yeah"
"but you said the quote was a joke and that you'd really only want one"
"apparently the joke back fired and its my combined xmas and birthday present"
"you're joking"
"nope, 3 snap on torque wrenches $1500, gifts from the family"
"nice family"
"yep"

But it gets better....

On a trip out to charleville with the SWMBO doing her dental thing a repair job came out and the discussion turned amongst other things to what Id need to do it, Welder.

off to the hardware store to look at welders and eye spy with my little eye, stainless steel fridge.

We deal with the formalities of checking out the places and the welders and a few other things beside sleep on it while I check out internet prices and head back to a likely store.

The salesman wasnt the one from yesterday, I tell him I want a welder, and he tries on the upsell, Do I want a roll of wire, yep, mask, yep, spare roller, yep... and once we're ringing up he asks glibly if I'd like a fridge with that? yep....

Double take

"well that was unexpected" he called the boss over because I wanted to drop the price down a bit because really I could buy the stuff cheaper if I tried hard enough and The boss didnt really want to until the guy at the counter told him the total I was about to spend so the boss came over looked at the order, then the sales guy and demanded to know how he'd managed to upsell a fridge onto a welder sale. I told him he just asked if I'd like a fridge with that.

Generally I dont buy raffle tickets in anything, why? simple If I buy tickets 2,3,4,6,7,8,9 the 3 winning tickets will be 1, 5 and 10. doesnt matter if theres 1000 tickets or 10 million the winning tickets are always the ones before or after mine.

The end of year raffle and my boss had made it known that he wanted 10 tickets, the young sarge selling them was looking for him as it was getting close to close up time and they just had to sell the last tickets (including my bosses) and it would start, I asked how many, got a number asked if I could chit them up, got an answer I liked so bought the boss his 10 tickets and the last 10 for myself. My boss doesnt drink and had openly offered that any booze he won was mine if I scrubbed off the cost for him right now. Done, I might just walk away with a carton since the tickets were in his name.

Second name drawn was mine. In and of itself it was unexpected...

1 Ipod shuffle, 50 dollar shopping voucher, Set of kitchen knives, 2 display bottles of spirits (comes with tumblers+ stuff) a bottle of spirits and 2 cartons of beer later (the boss won nothing but booze) later and I'm looking at a very large pile of free stuff totalling about $1k... Very unexpected. The irony? the boss won most of the booze.

now after the Xmas run to perth I did a trip up north, dropping stuff off picking stuff up....

One of the items I was ment to be picking up was a gearbox and engine for fozzy, for the price I was paying I was expecting to get something that fits in the category of "fixable, maybe" What I got was unexpected, unexpected to the tune of "highly likely to be in better condition than a brand new OEM item"

And all told, that wraps up january.

yes, I'm aware this may just be the reward for the rest of the pennance I serve in this thread.

Of course the Wife is in on it too (she started a lot earlier in this thread with the icecream baby eating thing)

After getting caught out by the flood blocking out path home at chinchilla we've spent the time back tracking to charleville with her doing her dental artistry business thing (shes a technician and prosthestist but I am not calling someone so inepet with general technology and tools a technician and really some of the stuff she does is a lot more like artwork than tech work) and so far has lined up more than the RRP of all of the other stuff Ive mentioned in this post. (yet she still whines when I order in a 6 pack of fuel filters when even if each filter only lasts one tank of vege oil is still cheaper than buying diesel)

Like a fridge with that? Yep. That's gold. But never seen fridges and welder s in the same shop

SWMBO and I had previously discussed getting a fridge more suited to her needs and presentation for business use. We werent originally planning on buying from that particular shop, when we'd looked the fridges werent listed on sale price, they'd marked it down overnight and met the price we were willing to pay for the fridge coupled together with the whole purchase they knocked it down a little further.

Sounds like you got a tight deal you have to have a win sometimes hey