I say potato, you say pota(r)to

ok, so the title of this post bears no direct relevance to the subject matter. I think the point I want to make is that  any time i  liaise with a 3rd party provider (gas, electric, builders, flooring co's, bath co's, door co's.. you get the jist) i feel like i am speaking a different language. Yesterday is a point in case. I arranged for the floor co to come and survey at 11 -12noon and the bifold door man to come and survey at 11. I dropped my youngest at nursery, popped to the shop on the way back and headed back home with william (him protesting as usual at having to do anything that involves going in a straight line direction) thinking i'd be in good time for my booked appointments. On arrival home, my builder told me the guy to survey the floor had been (and gone), having surveyed in my absence. Feeling a bit irritated, not least because I had some specific questions I wanted answered about our flooring depths etc, I waited for the door man to come at 11. At 11.10 I glanced at my email and found a message sent at 10.50 saying he wan't coming, along with apologies. so that was that. a totally flipping wasted morning waiting in for 2 people who didn't come (or came when I didn't want them to). What is the point of booking an appointment in the first place. I feel like  anything that can go wrong or add to the irritation of this project, generally does. to top it all I got a £60 parking ticket for parking my car one street away. nothing to do with the no-shows but it sort of summed up my day. bah humbug.