Posts tagged overit

In the last 16 months, my house has been damaged by the weather twice.

First, the car port roof blew off, the night my wife and I went to the Pearl Jam concert. The gate to the back yard went with it.

I had to argue with the guy that fixed the gate - who insisted that the sharp metal edges of the colour-bond were completely normal. Luckily our close friend next door is a builder who knows better and defended my children’s fingers on my behalf. The strange thing was that, when the reconstruction was complete and the building inspector came to see the work, he mentioned that because they had not demonstrated that the brick pillars were actually attached to the car port roof, they’d have to take it down and do it again. Amazingly, the builder showed up the next day and explained that the work had been approved and everything was fine.

The second time my house was damaged, one room was flooded resulting in carpet damage and damage to the painted walls, and the stuff that covers our slate floors was stained in the dining room. The insurance covered new carpet and had the damaged paint redone. They also covered the floor but only in the room where the damage occurred. Unfortunately, according to the carpet guy and the painter and the builder, you’d be able to see the difference between the newly resurfaced slate and the rest of the house if you did not get the whole lot redone together. So we asked the guy who came to assess the floors to do the rest of the house - $2k, but not for a month. Fine with us - we have a 6’ x 4’ x 4’ (900 litre) fish tank that needs taking care of before it could be done anyway - and what’s another two grand on top of the massive mortgage you have to have to own a house in Australia anyway? But not fine with the builder - so he gets someone else to come earlier. This guy only wants $500 to do the rest of the house. We were suspicious, asked a lot of questions, but were kinda happy to pay less and naively agreed. Long story short, the floor is stuffed; there’s crap sealed into it, it looks wet, it makes strange noises when you walk on it with wet shoes, bits are coming off, things underneath it are changing colour, and it marks easily. He came back with a wire brush and tin of resin to try and repair it once - painting over half the crap I pointed out under the sealant. After weeks of asking the builder (who doesn’t return my calls and thinks I’m exaggerating) still has not provided the guy’s details so that I can try and claim against his insurance. I bet he doesn’t have any.

Thankfully, my little brother happens to be an insurance lawyer. And I’m really stubborn. And the courts that could eventually be involved are all free. The consumer affairs people tell me that they’ll have to fix it all. Eventually. That’ll be my hobby for the next - I dunno - 18 months?

So when the pillars started separating from the car port the other day, I was understandably thrilled. I might get them to realign the gate that doesn’t shut properly while they’re fixing that.

We won’t go into my week at work. That might not be politically correct ;)

At least the local veggie shop gave me back the $4 they overcharged my wife last week without demanding a receipt.

[OT:

So, if “people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it”, then buy this: 

I love programming computers. I wrote my first assembly language program when I was 10. My passion is making computers do what I want. I’ve been doing it professionally for many years. I hate being ripped off. I am into artificial intelligence and I think there aren’t many ways to make a mind - so I think we have similarities. I have kids to feed and want a fair price for my work - which I have reason to believe is high quality. My cats love me so I’m a nice person, and wouldn’t think of stealing from you (or your kids), and so I charge fairly and don’t charge people for fixing defects in my work (commonly called ‘maintenance’ in the software industry). I am experienced at leading a software team and delivering beyond expectations on extremely challenging projects on the frontiers of the software industry. So if you want your computers to do something different, or know someone or some business that does, and you’re also sick of being ripped off, get in touch. sje397 at gmail.]

End rant #1. Deep breath. Thanks for listening.