Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?--The Contractor Episode

I need you. I love you. I'll do anything you want. 

There are no words sweeter to the ear. And lately I've been hearing them a lot.

It started with Mr. Wonderful whispering them to me, which is a good thing because I'm still crazy about him. So I'm glad he still likes me. Sort of.

Actually what Mr. Wonderful said in a hoarse voice while squeezed between the washing machine and the wall was: "I need you to hand me the Phillips screwdriver." When I gave him a tool, he said: "I'd love if you could ID a Phillips screwdriver." And when I dug through his tool box messing up its neat order, he said: "I'll do anything you want just leave my tools alone."

The trick to living with your spouse in a fixer upper house while fixing it up is having selective hearing. Which I do. Which is also probably why our relationship is still going. Which it is.

I need you. I love you. I'll do anything you want. 

But these honeyed words were also being bandied about by the roof company salesmen. Having someone else do our roof work, you say? Oh Mr. Wonderful did not come to this decision easily. For months he contemplated by himself removing our old roof by himself and laying a new one by himself. He even figured how many vacation days he'd need to do such a mammoth job. When I pointed out the summer weather forecast for the next four weeks and how our corner of L.A. would make Satan's home seem frigid, he decided that someone else could do the roof work. My man's the smartest!

Being a committed DIY-er though, he just didn't want the roof removed and the same type of roof put on. Oh no! He wanted a U.S. Department of Energy-approved "Cool Roof" installed to reflect the sun, keep our home cooler without using the air conditioning, and bring us world peace.

Diligently he met with various roofing company salesmen, showed them the job, and compared their quotes. They all said the same thing, "I need you. I love you. I'll do anything you want." But when fast-talking Roof Salesman #5 added that he could do the work for a fraction of the cost that the others had said, Mr. Wonderful believed him.

"Do you really want this fast-talking guy to put on our new roof?" I said making a cheese and cracker tray with one hand and balancing the baby in the other.
"He was the cheapest," my spouse said.
"But is he the best?"
"He's the best at being the cheapest," he said signing on the dotted line.

The guy was also the best at being the smarmiest. I need you. I love you. I'll do anything you want. But I won't write it in a contract.

Verbally the man agreed to the Cool Roof and its special specs that the DOE and Mr. Wonderful wanted. But on paper, this fast-talking Roof Salesman left lots of contractual loopholes to allow him to squeeze us everywhere for more moolah. It was a horrible feeling. So after being on the job for 48 hours, Mr. Wonderful did the only thing the contract allowed: he fired him.

But the fast-talking Roof Salesman's company was not doing the actual work. Oh, no! Instead it had hired a Contractor to have his workmen do the job and these workmen were already halfway done removing our old roof. When the firing happened, the work stopped, at which point we had a roof of exposed wooden boards. That's it. And it was the hottest part of July. So is my man smarter than a 5th grader? Maybe.

Hearing about the firing, the Contractor stepped up and said he could help us finish the job. He told us the magic words: I need you. I love you. I'll do anything you want. I'll just never see you. 

"Do you really want this mystery guy to put on the new roof?" I asked tossing a salad with one hand and holding the baby with the other.
"He's honest," my spouse said before hiring the guy via the telephone.

The guy was honestly the worst because Mr. Wonderful had never met him since said Contractor worked out of Lake Tahoe, which is eight hours away by car and on another planet from our roof. So after 48 hours Mr. Wonderful fired him. When the firing happened, the work stopped again, at which point we still had a roof of exposed wooden boards. At this point I realized the average bunny rabbit was smarter than my man.

But the Contractor was not doing the actual work on our roof. Oh, no! He had hired Sub-Contractors and they were the ones standing atop The House, risking their lives, to install the roof which had been completely stripped down to wooden boards. In the record-breaking August heat all we had between us and the fierce sun were a couple of thin, wooden boards. And I realized OMG: a cactus is smarter than my man.

Hearing about the firing, the Sub-Contractor stepped up offering to finish the job for us with the magic words: I need you. I love you. I'll do anything you want. I've just never done this before. 

"Do you really want this newbie guy to put on our new roof?" I asked stirring marinara sauce with one hand while holding the baby in the other.
"Better a new guy than an old one," Mr. Wonderful said hiring the newbie via text.

And this new guy was the best idea. He worked hard because it was his first managing gig, yet after five years of installing roofs, he knew what he was doing with Cool Roofs, and his crew followed his directions to a T. They shuffled the old roof tiles into the dumpster, installed the DOE-approved insulation, the special paper, the flashings, and laid the new super reflective tiles. They all did outstanding work. Oh my goodness! My spouse is so smart for hiring them. I never doubted my man!

At the end of the three and a half week job I walked inside our newly roofed house and realized the cool tiles did reflect the sun; and they did insulate the house from the heat, keeping our home a pleasant 76 degrees F without the air conditioning. Amazing.

However I'm still waiting for world peace.

Thanks for the Memories

The sun is shining, the pool water is 78 degrees, and there aren’t any home improvement projects on the horizon. Ahhh. Finally a relaxing day in our suburban California paradise. Here I come pool! What, I thought, could spoil this idyll? 

“You should replace your roof,” our 86 year-old neighbor called out from the perch of his lawn chair.

“Good morning, Harold,” I said plucking the newspaper from the driveway. “But our roof is fine.” 

“Your roof’s at least seven years old,” he said eyeing the shingles on our house as if he were a California Highway Patrol stopping a drunk driver on St. Patrick’s Day. Ever since Christmastime when Harold and Norma had gotten a new roof for their house, the 86 year-old had become the self-styled expert at home coverings doling out advice as he saw fit. Like now. “You should replace it.”

“Thanks, Harold, but it’s fine.”

“Oh,” he shrugged. “You want your roof to fall in? Well that’s your business.”

Months ago when the fear and excitement of the weather phenomenon known as El Nino was sweeping California bringing promises of wet weather and an end to the drought, a bajillion Golden State homeowners got their roofs redone. You couldn’t walk down a street where there wasn’t at least half a dozen homes getting their roofs stripped and re-shingled. Harold and Jean were two such eager homeowners. Since our elderly neighbors had witnessed the entire history of our house from our moving in day stretching back to the California Gold Rush, we asked them how old our roof was. 

“It was just redone,” Harold had said at the time. “About a year or two before you got here.” Which comforted us, giving Mr. Wonderful and me the confidence not to re-roof our house in the pre-El Nino rush. 

But now in one morning stroll to fetch the paper, our roof had aged becoming seven years old? Hmmm. Maybe Harold’s memory was off?

Taking the baby out for a walk I saw our 85 year-old neighbor in the driveway.

“Afternoon, Norma—”

“Harold’s wrong about the age of your roof,” she said hauling grocery bags out of her car.  

“Excuse me?”

“You roof’s at least ten years old.”

I found this nugget of information disturbing for several reasons: 1) Our neighbors discussed our roof’s history when we weren’t present; 2) Kids grow up fast, but our roof was aging faster than my child; 2) and 3) I still wanted to get in the pool but the pressure of buying a new roof was inserting cracks into my perfect summer idyll. Maybe Norma’s memory was off?

By the time I returned from the park with a sleepy baby, I saw both our elderly neighbors standing in their front yard, with another man wearing a fedora, staring at our house.  

“Hi Harold, Norma—”

“This is my brother, Steve,” Norma said hitching her thumb towards the hat-wearer in their threesome.

“And they’re both wrong,” Stephen said. “Your roof is over 25 years old.”

“What?! But they said—”

“Forget what we said,” Harold said tapping his head. “The memory is going. For both of us.”

And in one fell swoop my perfect summer day became frenzied with googling “new roofs”, “shingle roofs”, and “cool roofs”. So much for enjoying our pool. The idyll was gone. Arrrggggg. Harold and Norma, thanks for your memories.