In Hot Water – update

So it looks like the solar hot water panels will be installed just in time to get the government rebate. What an ordeal! Actually, most of the ordeal was listening to my grandmother yell at me repeatedly about the whole thing.

The company had promised to ring with an installation date, and didn’t. I rang the company and apologised for grandmother’s tantrum. Then I waited a couple of days and didn’t ring at all, just to not nag them. Then I rang and apologised again, claimed that grandmother was suffering from senile dementia, thanked the booking woman profusely for getting the tank installed early, and assured her that a July installation date would be just fine so long as they filled out the forms to say June so we’d get the rebate.

Of course, July would most likely mean my grandmother would explode in a shower of sparks and a puff of pale green smoke/ never speak to me again/ evict me. Booking Woman assured me that "purchased in full and installed by 30 June 2011" was a rebate condition perfectly satisfied by an installation started in June and and invoice drawn up in June. The man at the state Environment department saw it very differently, and he has terms and conditions to back him up. I hope this company knows their slippery way around the bureaucracy, and nobody gets stuck with July-dated receipts and declined rebate applications. I’m all for bending the rules when necessary, but I’m dead against doing so in a sloppy ignorant manner that gets you caught.

Anyway, after I agreed cheerily to July 7 (two weeks later than promised), Booking Woman paused and said, "oh wait, I have one spot left for June 30."

So. I am not popping any champagne until the panels are actually up and the forms duly signed and dated. I’m assuming this year would be a bad time to ask grandmother for a ceiling fan, a dehumidifier for the mould problem, or money to help buy a heater/air conditioner to replace my decrepit 20 year old heater.

It’s not clear yet how my grandmother’s going to interpret her role in all this drama, now that the smoke is clearing. She might stay resentful and distrustful of my father and I for daring to recommend something so expensive as solar hot water. (Incidentally, I would have happily put in twice the $300 in question to have solar. I offered, too.) Or she might have the decency to feel a wee bit ashamed of herself and try to mend bridges. Either way, I think things are going to be a mite frosty for a while.

As to the origins of grandmother’s appalling behaviour, no, it’s not senile dementia as far as I’m aware.  She’s been this way for a long time.  She may have been a little crazy from having a bad pain day – though it did last all week.  She told me once that in her early twenties, she once saw a woman berating a shopkeeper in a busy part of the city, and took it into her head that that’s how one gets ahead in the world. 

While she’s kind and generous to her own family and friends – to the point of being a doormat, on occasion – I must say, sadly, that her circle doesn’t extend very far.  There’s a very harsh line drawn between "my people" and "screw them".