There are some Basic Laws of Nature that are hidden silently in the
bushes, ready to pounce like cats on unwary folks. Like those
kitty-poos, these Laws are not at all obvious. They have to
be discovered by painful experience.
As a service to Humanitude,
I'm going to spread the word on a particularly dangerous BLON (Basic
Law Of Nature) lurking in the bushes of life.
It goes thisaway: If you come across a neighbor who offers you a hot tub ("spa" to you
yuppie-types) free-fer-nuthin', RUN AWAY!! Go get some garlic
and wear it around your neck. Develop a sudden interest in bungee-jumping,
sky-diving, or some other far safer endeavor.
For it is a truth
that when a hot tub comes your way "free", you're about to take a
bath.
This harsh lesson began for me while I was helping Ken
Twaddell as he labored on his wooden deck. It already covered
the better part of an acre, but Ken was determined to "round it out"
a little. My help was crucial as I was supplying him with an
unending stream of sage advice for which wondrous help I did not charge
a penny. I was being careful to explain to him where he was
going wrong, and what he should do next, etc., etc.,
I could
tell Ken appreciated my efforts, as he would stop work every now and
then, and sort of stand stock still, with his eyes squeezed shut. He was obviously ruminating on various important points that I had
made. It's good to feel appreciated.
And then it happened.
I
had just asked Ken what the big hole in the deck over there was for. He mumbled something about conversation pit (at first I thought he
said snake pit). And then he continued.
"Yeah, Walt, the
hot tub used to go in there. That's it over there by the edge
of the lawn."
There was a sudden, furtive gleam in his eye (the
good one, not the one he keeps in a jar at night). He looked
back and forth at the tub and me.
"Say, would you like a hot
tub for free?" His face had a haunted look -- almost pleading;
it was very strange. "All you have to do is get the boys to
carry it over to your place and hook it up."
Innocent that I
was, my larcenous heart leapt at the thought of getting this neato
thing gratis.
"Gee, thanks, ole buddy! I'll get the boys
and haul it right outa here!" O, more fool, I! I could
hear a cello somewhere playing two notes: da-DUM... da-DUM...
, the theme from "Jaws". But I ignored it.
When my two
fine sons, Scooter and Pucky went to pick it up, they pointed out
to me that first we really should empty it. There was about
eighteen inches of gummy liquid in it, composed of rainwater, lawn
clippings, and small, green, unidentifiable reptiles. Much of
the gummy stuff had migrated into those little holes they put in hot
tub bottoms to blow cold bubbles. I could see I'd had a tough
time cleaning them out, but oh, tra-la.
The sides were a little
slimy. This caused a mild mishap as we carried the tub across
the street and up my driveway: when it finally slipped, it took
a pretty fair amount of paint off of my new car. The dent wasn't
that bad, though. We got it hammered out a few months later. Overall, it only set me back $600. And another $600 for the
paint job.
The real problem arose when we tried to get the hot
tub into the screened pool enclosure. One of the panes of glass
on the door got busted before we broke down and admitted that the
doorway was too small. It wasn't until later that I found out
you must buy a whole new door -- there's no way to replace the window
panes. What a pain.
So we took out a section of screen. It was easy to choose which section... we took the one that we ripped
when we staggered back from breaking the door. There's no way
anyone could tell me that you can't get screen material (although
the Fabled PC said that now I'd have to replace all of the 36 panels,
because the colors no longer matched). Wow! That stuff
comes dear; I found out later I was down another $600, I should have caught the significance of the 6-6-6, but since that
information came later, I innocently pushed on.
Now the hot tub
was in the screened porch. Unfortunately, the Fabled PC said
that it was too big, and we would have to extend the porch. Which means we retained the Fools R Us contracting company to have
a new slab poured. And to have a new screen enclosure addition
built on. And the gutter system now had to be routed out over
the screened area, which resulted in the fact that the roof began
to leak. And the 220-volt separate electrical system had to
be installed (along with the new junction box on the side of the house). And the hot tub heater/pump had to be replaced. Ken was honest
about that; he had told me that it was no good.
And then it got
really bad.
The bedroom wall got knocked out, to be replaced
with sliding glass doors. This meant new wall-to-wall carpeting
in the bedroom, as the old carpet was somewhat crusty with the concrete
poured on it by Fools R Us.
But the day came when we climbed
in the hot tub, wineglasses in hand, to savor the luxury. The
moment lasted for at least two minutes. That was how long it
took me to realize that the 15 thousand dollar mortgage extension
I'd gotten was entirely spent.
Ken stays away a lot, now.
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