So we started having issues with the air conditioner. The biggest problem with having things repaired on an RV is that you have to have them towed into a shop. Yeah, that wouldn't work for us, we live here and I don't think they'd have let us live in the shop. So we checked around and found a mobile RV repair man. We also found out that unfortunately he was the only game in town and he could charge whatever he wanted.
I've noticed that as a woman when I take my car to a mechanic I can tell if he's a crook just by how he treats me. If he treats me like an equal and seems to quote fair prices then he's not a crook and he can work on my car. If he talks down to me and treats me like a "mark" then guess what I can get in my car and drive somewhere else. If I use this technique enough I eventually find a mechanic that doesn't treat me like I'm a moron just because I'm a woman. That works great because generally there are many mechanics in any given town.
So we called the mobile RV repair man. He showed up in a box truck with a cherry picker attached, which was good because he was a really large man and I didn't want him crawling around on the roof of my Airstream. The Airstream roofs have weak spots and if you don't know where they are or just don't care you can do some serious damage. This guy didn't seem like the type who would care.
Wynn and I knew he was going to be trouble. The second he saw that we were two women we could see his eyes light up. He had that look in his eye like he could empty our wallets and we'd thank him for it. To him we were "marks" just because we weren't men. He was the type of man that scratches and snorts and spits while talking to you. He was all pit stains and beer belly. An utterly disgusting and chauvinistic man. I wanted to vomit just being near him, you could smell the misogyny wafting off of him like B.O.
He had a helper and it was the helper that did all of the work. The chauvinist stayed on the ground while telling us how we needed an new unit and how much it would be and that he could install it. All this without actually looking at the unit itself. His helper quietly took off the air conditioner shroud and removed a very large mud dauber nest and a ton of fall leaves. He then replaced the shroud and turned on the now working air conditioner all while his boss gave us outlandish part and labor rates. $1000 for a new air conditioner, they only run about $600. $1000 for the labor. Seriously? Come on man, we're not stupid.
We ended up paying for the debris removal and sending him on his way both of us needing a shower after just being near him and vowing to never use him again for anything.
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