Thursday, March 7, 2013

Just hit me over the head next time...much less painful

I received a phone call about a month ago about some free carpet cleaning.

Awesome, I thought, we've been talking about cleaning our carpet for months now, and here are some people telling us they will do it for FREE!

Our carpet looks diseased, riddled with spots and hard, crunchy parts. Full of grape juice stains, sand and rubbed in old french fries. If you removed all the crap from a home that previously contained hoarders, it's what you would find underneath...minus the dead cats.

When the carpet lady called, I wanted to know everything. All they said is that they we're referred to me by a friend (friend is now a term I shall use loosely) and it would take them approximately an hour and a half to shampoo our carpets. For free.

"For free?" I asked, hesitant to accept until I understood fully. She reassured me that it would be free because of this referral.

"Free" usually means "there's a catch somewhere, good luck finding it in time to save yourself the money".

So I referred her to my, super-chatty, husband.

My husband took the phone call but didn't look into it like I thought he would. He's usually more inquisitive than I when it comes to "free" stuff, so I thought FOR SURE that he would ask more questions. But he didn't. All he did was jump on the "free" boat and set up an appointment.

You can probably guess where this is leading.

Or maybe you're like us, suckers.

Our appointment arrived and the "team" of carpet cleaners turned into one man with a box.

Inside this box was a Kirby vacuum.

Uh-oh.

I'm not claiming to be a psychic or anything, but I had a feeling that we were in for it.

If you have ever had a vacuum person come to your home, you know how it all starts. They use your vacuum to clean your home then put in the magical, pristine white filters in their vacuum and then use that to really clean your home.

I was gagging. After vacuuming for an hour, he had about a sandbox full of filth, lint and old food.

"I swear, I vacuum everyday! OK, not every day..but at least since last summer!"

"It's not your fault", he assured me, soothing my anxiety about having filth consume my home, "it's just your vacuum."

But my husband and I were still firm in our position about not buying this vacuum.

Not going to happen.

$2,000? Nope. I could buy books or shoes. Screw having a clean floor.

But then the deals started to happen...and my husband was all "It was pretty gross seeing all that dirt..."

Crap. I knew it was up to me to save our bank account. Shoes and books. Remember, all shoes and books that I could purchase instead!

I tried remaining strong.

He suggested we give him friends and family as referrals to get more money taken off the price of the vacuum. But I couldn't let my friends and family be sucked in like we were. Tricked. Bamboozled. I don't have many friends to begin with...I should work harder to keep them.

Then he shampooed our carpet.

That's what our carpet is supposed to look like!

I think we just threw our credit card at him. Not quite sure what happened exactly, I blanked out after that but I am now an owner of a brand new vacuum cleaner and my carpets look and smell fantastic.

3 hours + $1,200 = an evening full of regret.

OK, it's not that bad. I get clean floors, I guess.

I still think I would look better in high heels.






2 comments:

  1. Oh no! Sorry to hear, but yay clean carpets? We just went to a "Home Expo Show" last night and it was like 500 of these little sales pitches in a row. Those people have had some kind of satanic training to suck your contact information out of you while they talk. Gonna spend the next two months telling people "thanks but no thanks" over the phone I think.

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  2. Oh Danielle, I swear I just read my way into a twilight zone, or de javu, let me tell you a little story....

    It was 2008, we (my husband and I) just bought our very first home as a married couple, two children in tow, one baking in the mommy oven. It was February, I remember like it was yesterday, we had just closed on this house in March. I am home with the two little chicklets and I get a knock knock at my door. I think oh neighbors coming to say hello, ummmm nope it was a man offering to shampoo my newly purchased homes carpets, (well aftter a bit of chit chat he learns we just bought, and seeing my 3 month old on the floor and my baby bump, he says ma'am you cant be too safe with your little ones, who knows how well they cleaned before you moved in!!!!) So next thing you know hes shampooing, then vaccuming my mattresses and my floors and yes yes he brought out the pristine white cloth and showed me just how filthy my home was....

    So I call my hubby at work and I tell him the whole story, he says "well honey you are the money person if you think we can afford it YOU make the decision". So I think I am awesome and I get him down from $2000 to $1200. Hubby comes home sees my lovely Kirby in the living room, his eyes get big and he says "you bought it, honey your the practical one, what did you do?" ha ha wow thanks HUSBAND.... and then in his next breath, can I try it first, heck no fool you dont clean the house I do!!!! (thats what I said) So yes we (I) was bamboozeled as well.....

    Oh yeah by the way while my mom was at work one day my dad got suckered as well hahahaha, mom was not tooooooooooo pleased!!!!

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