Monday, June 30, 2008

Papa Don't Preach, Part I: My New Windows

Gentle readers, you may have noticed in my last post the octagonal porthole windows above the window boxes. There are four of them on the front and side of my house. One of them opens and has a screen. One of them opens, but has no mechanism to keep it open and also lacks a screen. Two of them cannot be opened at all. So, we decided to have the three useless ones replaced with normal rectangular windows that seal along with the window at the top of the house in my study, which has no screen and also is not sealed well.

Two months ago, a gentleman named Nelson come to the house to give me an estimate for the work. He works for a company that manufactures the windows locally, which I think is nice. He measured, we discussed the specific kinds of windows that should be placed in each opening, he gave me a reasonable estimate, and he left. I called the next day to tell him that we wanted to go ahead with the project and sent him a deposit.

About a week later, I received the receipt in the mail. It looked like a fairly normal receipt except for the box toward the top, which was printed in large font with the words "Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life." I thought it was a little strange, but then forgot about it.

Two months passed and I hadn't heard from Nelson, who said that he would send some of his colleagues to the house to measure one more time before they manufacture the windows. So I called him last week to find out what was happening and finally got him to commit to sending these guys this afternoon after 4:00. I made sure that I was home by 4 and I waited. And I waited. And soon it was after 5:30 and there was still no sign of these guys. I was mentally preparing for a beat down with Nelson.

Suddenly, a truck pulls up to the house with a trailer attached and the name of this company on the side. I went to the door to let them in and I saw two Amish men walking toward the house. The Amish are installing my new windows! Now a lot of things make sense, not the least of which is the "message" on the receipt. They were very nice, talkative men and they are coming back in a few weeks to handle the window installation, so I'll blog about it more then. What I'm most excited about is that Amish people wear pants with an extremely high rise, so there will be no male cleavage sightings while they are here.

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