Yesterday I had more fun time with my Dad, after going to the Apple Store, I was tired but still ready to do some things. I had slept in my parent's room on their couch, and woke up at 7:30. The night before I decided to go to Dad's car dealership, even though Mom was kind of sad about seeing me leave again. Oh well. Dad told me last night we were to wake up at 6:00 and leave at 7:30. Well, we woke up at 7:30 and left at 8:30 something. We were a little off schedule, and we were also hungry. Dad and I drove the suburban, yet again, and stopped at Rhea's, a little breakfast stop in the same flat white brick building Corner Grocery is on. The grocery is on the front, facing a street, Rhea's facing another. It's on a patch of road at an intersection. I had been to Rhea's before, and had met Jimmy, a rough and mean dark skinned man who's ancestry is from India or somewhere else, and has a deep accent. As we walked in, looking upon the tables, counter, and basic concession stand style. Jimmy welcomed us, surprisingly, and asked about "your wife" as he put it, and they talked about different people in the town of Roswell, what they've been doing and such. The last times he had been unfriendly and rough, a reptile of sorts. Now he was just the opposite. It was interesting how in changed in 6 months.
He gave us some biscuits of sorts, and as we drove through Atlanta we ate them, now being on an interstate. They were okay. We then talked about what had questioned me the night before, and I read the book to him and found out a lot of financial terms and such. It was interesting. Dad said he had given the little book to some people, most of them didn't read it. I didn't want to disappoint. It might've been a little over my comprehension and level but I wanted to read it anyway. It's about a guy deep in debt who happens upon a rich lady who gives him 4 laws on being out of debt. I finished the first chapter as we rode toward Lineville, little businesses and an old little high school, plus numerous little homes. Lineville is close to the Alabama/Georgia line, hence the name. It's a nice little town. On a road is a flat roofed building with nice cars all around and in front of it. It has a connection added only about a year and a half before, and looks like any basic dealership, columns with a covered patio thing, with glass that sees through the front lobby. It had added on parts a while ago, and now looks better than ever. I was excited to see it again as we passed in, seeing the Clay County Chrysler Dodge Jeep Chevrolet sign, dangling from a large post, with an under sign saying Happy Holidays. We went through all the nice cars, looking at them. We came up and parked on the right side of the dealership. We got out of the car.
Cavin Hill (yes that is how he spells his name, long story), the General Manager for the dealership, walked out of the store, towards us. He has glasses, grey flat hair, and is pretty tall. I shook his hand. Pretty warm. We said regular words you say to someone who you haven't seen in 6 months; I'm pretty sure you have a good idea of what we said. No need to repeat those same, over used words again. Anyway, one of the service guys came over, and we said hello to him. His name is Jeffery. Thin, black hair with beard, good guy. Has blue jumpsuit. Yep. We then entered, and I looked upon the long unseen lobby again, and it had changed a little. Little desks in a horizontal line by the front door, two desks in the back, one enclosed in glass, where Jason Hill (cousins) was seated. It used to be the office of Gerry Kirkland, but he went away. The second one was the desk of Kristin Thompson, who became a full time employee at the dealership the day she graduated, August 6, which is my birthday. Kind of cool to have that connection with her. To the left is two doors going to two large offices with a bathroom in between, my Dad's and Cavin's. By Kristin's is a hallway going into the back and a room with printer and other things. To the far right is a counter where Joan Foster, the lady who answers calls and welcomes customers, sits. I saw Joan and we had good few words together. She is a like 45-50 year old woman, with black hair that's up into a kind of towel position. She's usually in a dress of some sort, Cavin, Jason, and the other salespeople in suits, the service guys in suits too, jumpsuits, that is. She's very nice. Very excited to see me, she was. I'm friends with all the people at the dealership. I shook hands with Jason, a robust, funny, witty, but sometimes en lighting and serious man, who has flat black hair and glasses. I said hello to Kristin, young, brown or blonde haired, very pretty. I talked to them both for a while, and described and talked of the trip. I told my favorite place.
Before I could see anyone else besides Tim Carroll (tall, thin, grayish haired with it being straight, nice guy to talk to sometimes), Cavin and Dad and I got in a blue silverado on the line (the cool thing about being a car dealership owners son is that you can go into and experience all of these cars, and go into places of a dealership you would never get to see if you were a customer), driving behind the dealership, through rough blocked off roads with orange netting, going into mud piles and dirty uphill drives. Now I knew why we took a truck. We went and saw a red brick nice high school, that was still in progress, almost finished. It was really pretty and had a baseball, football, and soccer field, a green house, two gyms, and many classes. It was really nice. Cavin had an idea of moving some of the cars away from the highway and onto the road that goes to this, advertising in a way to the sixteen year olds who wanted a car. Smart Marketing. It's like writing two books and advertising your one book in the second book, which is done in the Four Laws thing. Again, smart marketing.
As we drove back we parked and saw that everybody was going to lunch, and before we went I went in the back hallway to see the conference room with table and desks, and to see the room with the fridge, table, and cabinets, where people eat some stuff. Then I saw the back office of Tammi, and said hello to her. She has short hair, blonde and brown at that, and has nice white teeth. She is very nice, and although she is, has most of the boring jobs like sorting papers and making deals are going through and stuff. I would hate to be stuck up in an office all day. I would run out and steal some peppermints on the way. Anyway, I talked to her a little about different things, and then later went to the front and talked to Don Shepard, an older man with white hair and glasses, who is great to listen and talk to, and apart from selling cars, he plays gospel music on Alabama 100.1. He talked about that and I asked him questions about it, and then I went into the customer waiting room and then walked into the service department, with the equipment of all kinds and the concrete floor and cars in un normal appearances. I saw the old waiting room, a little "room" which now had cabinets and a blocked off door. It used to be so nice. Oh well. The new one is more modern, open, colorful, better chairs, two T.V.'s, a bathroom, all to the right and behind the lobby. I walked around and didn't go very far because I had no one to talk to; they were all at lunch. Dad and Cavin and Cavin's girlfriend Dana all said come on to me to get into the blue golf cart to go to Annita's, a little diner on that road. We had a good meal of regular country food, to wit: mashed potatoes, fried chicken, baked beans, corn bread, green beans, it was all great. A guy named Rick who owned a Piggly Wiggly asked us how many we saw along the trail, and we talked about that kind of things, sightseeing and favorite places, for a while. Somehow we got to the topic of hunting, and they all shared stories. It was a good time.
Back at the Dealership I showed my Big Book of Boy Stuff to Jerry Turman, a nice tall African American guy at the dealership who's a salesman. He was reading aloud some experiments and interesting facts, stating to an old customer that these things could come in handy. "Oh, I won't need that," the man said. Jerry kept telling him all this stuff, from police talk to sun dials. It was pretty funny, actually. I went back into my Dad's large office, with the table and shelves of books. It's nice, but I must admit Cavin's is nicer. It has a lot of cool car pictures, and many du dad's, as my dad calls trinkets and unnecessary items. I saw Irving Thompson, Kristin's father, who is a tall, slightly bearded fellow, but not heavy on the beard. The whole time we were there there was always SOMEBODY in Dad's office, except at night when the store closed. But that's in a different part of the story. I went back and sat down close to an old, bored looking women at the customer waiting. I opened a little conversation, just to get her from being bored, and I was bored to, I needed someone to talk to myself. She turned about to be a very big talker, stating facts of quilting and speaking of Nicolas Sparks. I told her that it was Mark Twain's Birthday today, and we talked of his books. She said her pad remote control device to open her car wouldn't open the car up, and later a man from the service department told her it was the pad that was broken, and that he would have it fixed in a day or two, telling some other things. For the information of the blog, I asked the name of the old lady. "Woodruff." She answered. "What's yours?" And just as she was walking out, I said, "Andrew." and I heard her say to the service guy as the door closed, "What a polite little boy."
Woodruff. An interesting name. I'll have to use it one of these days.
I went to the service department and saw through his little glass spot Jeff Diggs, in his big parts room. He is right behind Tammi; they are married. I've been in Jeff's place before, and went up stairs to more parts in an attic kind of place. I also met a service guy I had not been acquainted with before, a young African-American named Bruce. I then went into the big work-on-car room, and stood under a car that was lifted up on a machine, right under it, admiring all the technical stuff. That was fun. I then asked some things to Cavin about being manager, and then sat and talked with Jason about some serious things. I then was stumped. I read aloud riddles from the BBOBS (Big Book of Boy Stuff) and Joan didn't get many but Tammi, Jason, and Tim were pretty good on them. I talked to Kristin about selling cars, and then was so bored I asked Tammi if I could do a job. She handed a me a giant stack of white pieces of paper with all kinds of official looking things on it, and I was told to do if I wanted to to sort all by year, making piles of all. I did all the years from 1995 to 2012, and at first making piles I was pretty lousy, and bored. My friend Alyssa called asking if I could go out to dinner with her and her parents and my parents, but I sadly informed her I wouldn't be home from Alabama until like 8:40 or something. Oh well, she said. She informed me she missed me a lot.
I got better as it as Tammi said that the time for a person to do it was so and so (I forget), and so I tried to beat it. Coincidentally, something like that in the Four Laws book occur ed with a story about a guy with bottles he had to organize. By and by I got better and better, and about almost done with it a little 8 year old with bangs and orange hair and an electronic device came over, and as I stacked them all in a way Tammi told me to do, (one year vertical the next horizontal, and so on and so on) I talked to the kid, who is Dana's son, the mayor of Lineville's grandson, and his name was Tanner. He talked about his video game unstoppable, and even checked his FaceBook on a computer at the dealership. HE has as FaceBook! At 8! Amazing and weird too. Oh well. Tammi left, and then I did some things with Tanner, we watched some people put signs on a Honda in a cool way for a parade for Natural Gas. That was interesting. I tried to get him and me to do an activity in my book, but he didn't seem impressed or into it. Day turned to night and I looked around for Don and Tim, seeing them both gone. I knew Don's absence, this was the night he does his radio thing, but Tim was sad that I didn't see him. I'm going back Monday so I'll see him then. Dana, Tanner, Irving, and other people left, and Cavin too. I said all goodbye to them. For a while Jason and Dad and I just stayed in Dad's office and listened to Don's radio station, and Jason called the number, requesting a song from a choir. I don't remember the song or the artist. But, Don later at the end of the song he WAS playing, said he was sending the next song out to Jason, and then he advertised the car dealership a lot. It was a good song about a guy who tried out for the choir every year for 34 years, only to be turned down every time. They were holding auditions one year and there was a lot of stormy clouds and thunder and lightning, and then it all stopped and the people heard from Heaven a voice saying that "I've found a choir that'll let me sing" meaning the guy was dead. It's kind of sad, but kind of good. We then listened to one intently because Don said straight to Dad and me to "listen to this one" and after it was over I said to Don it was good. Although, he couldn't hear me. Oh well.
It was cool to be talked to and referred to on the radio, really, really cool. Jason then left and Dad and I sat in silence and talk for a long time, waiting for something to download on the iPad. It did eventually and we left. I had a great, a really great and fun time, at the dealership. I love that place.
On the way home although I was very tired, I read about the first law of debt freeness, tracking your expenses and reducing the amount that's being depleted out of your account. I won't go into details. It was interesting to learn about all this though. Interesting.
We got home and went to bed. End of story. Goodbye for now.
I like to look and admire cars,
Andrew.
No comments:
Post a Comment