It's a good thing I hung around

I've found out one thing about a home remodeling project. Make sure you have plenty of vacation time handy or a very flexible work schedule. I'm lucky to have a bit of both. I've been writing from home or working at night more than I expected.
Monday, knowing the gas was going to be hooked up, I took a vacation day so I would know where all of the shut off valves were. I suspected that the gas crew would be there in the morning and I could play at least 9 holes in the afternoon. No such luck. But it turns out by 2 p.m. I couldn't have swung a club if my life depended upon it.
Around 9 a.m., a lone carpenter came to install the range hood. We had a decorative range hood built. It's black and really makes the room pop. But it is a heavy sucker. I wondered how the single carpenter was going to get that on the wall. I found out I was going to help him. Hey, no problem. I was there anyways.
It took us a couple of tries to get it centered and flush with the ceiling. While I was holding the hood I thought to myself how glad I was that I'd been working out regularly for the last year. It was heavy but I didn't feel any strain. That was until about 2 minutes after it was on the wall. A ripping pain hit me in the middle of my back. It was so sharp that it hurt to cough (lucky me, I'm in the coughing stage of my current cold). I spent the rest of the day pressing my back into my chair and trying to suppress the urge to cough.
After the hood was installed the gas guy finally came. By then, I was a tad more comfortable but the back still spiked with pain if I moved too quickly or in a certain way.
I didn't know this, but gas ovens come fitted for natural gas, they have to be refitted with different valves for LP gas. The gas guy was working on this part of the job when he asked me if I had a 7 millimeter wrench. I've got plenty of kitchen tools but I'm a little short in the wrench department (although my back was wrenched pretty good by then). The gas guy said the needed wrench was on the other truck. (What kind of company doesn't have a complete set of wrenches on every service truck?) I asked a neighbor if he had one, no luck.
This news left the gas guy scratching his head. It left me knowing what I'd have to do if I wanted my stove installed. I gingerly got in my car to make a run to the hardware store to buy a 7 millimeter wrench. My aching back told me I may be getting too old to easily slip my 6-foot-2 frame into my little Honda Del Sol for very much longer.
Driving home from the store all I could wonder is this: Where would these guys be if the customer hadn't taken the day off? Maybe the gas guy could have helped the carpenter? Maybe the carpenter had a 7 millimeter wrench?
Although my neighbor didn't have a wrench, he had something more important — some pain pills to relax my back. By the next morning my back had pretty much returned to normal. I had a hood, the stove was installed (more on that next time) and I was the proud owner of a 7 millimeter wrench.