FURTHER JERK OF ALL TRADES ADVENTURES
DEAR JERK: I’m so incensed. My builder remodeler left such a mess and he did things all wrong. He didn’t cut miter joints like you’re supposed to for the trim wood, just cut them perpendicular and left it at that, looking all awkward and ill-fitting. I even caught him drinking on the job! Can you imagine? His work is so sloppy it looks like some kind of beatnik haven, not like a decent home. Now I have to live with this mess. – Hattie Lou McGillicutty, New Haven, New Hampshire.
DEAR HATTIE LOU: Well, I’ll tell you, Hattie, you’re dealing with a beatnik remodeler here, know ‘em well. See, some guys and gals have a natural bent toward living a looser lifestyle and don’t mind imposing it on others. Of course when they’re working for you they really should take that into consideration, but not always the case. What you want to do if you do it again is to check out the living quarters of such carpenters. Do it under pretense of wanting to see his workshop or some such excuse and if he’s amenable you’ll see firsthand his living conditions. If there’re two near-naked females lounging on a mattress on the floor and a couple of roaches in the ashtray – I mean the smokeable kind – you might get some idea of what you’re dealing with. Also take note of the guy’s speech patterns. If he’s wont to say things like “far out, man” or “like wow, man” you might be dealing with an old hippie. See, that kind doesn’t take things so seriously as you do. They can live with unfinished interiors, unpainted exteriors and so on, you know like the housepainter who never paints his own house, the plumber who never fixes the leaky faucet, the electrician with no plates on the outlets and so on and so on. It’s like the young housewife who ran up to a police officer shrieking “Officer, officer, I’ve just been raped by a housepainter”. Cop says, “Whoa, hold on a minute lady, calm down now; how do you know he was a housepainter anyway?” Lady says, “Well, he was wearing all white and he didn’t finish the job!” Yadda yadda yadda, ba da boom. Remodeling and repair are fields that seem to attract unusual type people, well like me. Actually I’m remodeling my own hovel – I mean home – soon, as soon as I can get these girls off the mattress on the floor. Then you can come by and check out my credentials. As to drinking on the job, that’s perfectly legitimate, Hattie. They call it “paint thinner”, those preparations that smooth out the bumps in the road, especially effective for plasterers and painters because the jobs are so mundane that a little stimulus is actually helpful toward getting in the swing of things, get the rhythm thing going, dig it? It won’t do any good to report this guy, in any case; he’s unlicensed and totally irresponsible beyond what he considers the right way to do things. You can take him to small claims court but it’s futile since he has nothing in the bank anyway, no reportable income, destitute insofar as normal society is concerned. That’s the chance you take when you find the wildcatter tradesmen. Some of ‘em even write columns for the homelorn like yourself. Better luck next time, Hattie Lou. – JOAT
mjmackay 