TuttleTree.com

What is a blog, if not a soapbox for me to stand on and tell you about things that I love and hate?

For starters, I hate feeling ripped off. I won't say that I was ripped off, because there are two sides to every story and I'm trying to be fair; but at the very least, I feel ripped off.

You may have heard that our heater was out of service. On Saturday, November 7th, Megan was taking some things down to the basement and noticed a small puddle under the heater. Monday the 9th she called the same company that had fixed our sump in 2007, Horn Plumbing and Heating. They made an appointment to come out and inspect it that Friday, the 13th, and the guy they sent ("Jeff") was, I believe the technical term is, "dragging ass."

He took his sweet time working, knowing full well they charge by the hour — even for estimates. I was at work, but Megan says he was here for about one hour (the bill would list this visit as 2 hours). He hadn't scheduled enough time to do everything he needed to, so he scheduled a follow-up appointment for the following Tuesday, the 17th. He did a poor job explaining the problem and risks, left the heater off, and packed up and left.

Not realizing that he had (probably?) intentionally left the heater off — because he failed to explain that it should be! — we later discovered that it was off (it got cold!) and turned it back on, assuming he had accidentally left it off.

When he came back on Tuesday, he was here for around 3 hours (the bill would list 4), and although he believed he knew what the problem was, he couldn't show us what was broken. This time when he left, he left the heater running.

Knowing we had a broken heater on our hands, but not satisfied with Horn, we sought a second opinion. Brewers came out three days later, on Friday the 20th, and within an hour had taken apart the heater and diagnosed the problem; and could even show Megan the crack and leak with one of those neat video cameras on a tube that could get into tight places. And they did all of that for a flat rate, and didn't charge us anything for drive time.

The Brewers tech said that while the carbon monoxide measurements were currently extremely low and not anything dangerous, there's no telling how fast it might escalate. He said that he couldn't in good conscience leave our house with the heater running or advise us to turn it on after he left. Quite a difference from what the Horn tech had said before leaving, which was more or less nothing! (Thanks for thinking of our health, jerk!) So we knew we would be without heat for a few days. It was nothing too drastic as we generally keep it set pretty low and dress warmly anyway; but we bought and borrowed a few space heaters for Dyan's room and ours, and used our gas fireplace in the family room.

Unfortunately, the prognosis was made late in the day on Friday, so they weren't able to order our replacement parts until Monday, the 23rd — and then there was no telling how long it would be until the parts would arrive. It could potentially have been through Thanksgiving and Dylan's Birthday party on Saturday. Luckily, it didn't take that long. The parts arrived to Brewers the following day on the 24th, and they came back to our house on the 25th to do the repair. They sent 3 people to work from about 10:00 until noon.

Then the bill arrived from Horn. $700.12! For an estimate! You've got to be freaking kidding me! For comparison, the estimate from Brewers was listed on the bill as $95, but crossed out: they had decided to waive it out of the kindness of their hearts. So our estimate from Brewers cost $0. Megan called Horn to complain and after a few days of phone tag and quibbling they begrudgingly agreed to reduce it to $355.12. Definitely not what I consider a fair and honest business.

If I ever have another heating or cooling problem, I will call Brewers. I will never call Horn again.

Unfortunately, this is no April Fool's joke.

If you'll recall, I have mentioned that the people that live behind us have some … quirky habits. This time, I was able to catch them in the act. Let's see what we can extrapolate from this photo.

She's wearing a coat and hat, so it's probably pretty cold. I was there, and I can vouch for that. You must really need a back shaving to be willing to strip down and do it in the dead of winter. (A.K.A. Pennsylvania "Spring")

This photo was taken on March 24th, and the last time I wrote about the phenomenon was on March 10th of 2007. Either March is National Back Shaving Month, or they are pretty regular about this. I know I've seen it more than once a year, but I'm guessing it's on their calendar.

I didn't have time to switch to my zoom lens, so the quality isn't that great — luckily I have a high resolution camera and was able to crop down the original to get something reasonable.

When I took the first photo in this series the flash fired and I was sure I had been made. I ducked out of sight and tried not to die laughing. Luckily, they are as oblivious as they are apparently hairy.

Over the weekend we (finally!) finished up our new built-ins. I think they look pretty good for a couple of amateurs:

I don't know how much we spent on them, but I guarantee you it was way less than what we would have paid to have them installed professionally. The cabinets are pre-fab, and were about $100 each (~$600), and the rest of it is from 3 sheets of plywood (~$150). Add another hundred dollars or so for paint and supplies. Then, oh, I don't know… 7,000 hours of work. Also a big thank you to DadR who gave some most-excellent guidance and even helped us make a few cuts and assemble the shelves.

Now I can be lazy in my free time again.