My sister and her boyfriend stayed over at my house for the last two nights. While I’m a girl of routine it’s kinda nice to have extra people around. For instance I got home last night to a clean sink, dinner being cooked, the fire had been lit and the sheets that I’d put in the washing machine that morning were now in the house and dry. Ah, luxury.

Normally I would have come home and not bothered to light the fire on a week night where I have work the next day, I would have got some dinner out of the freezer (a meal I’d prepared earlier), I would have had to wash the dishes and I would have had to get the sheets off the line before they got damp. And that’s before everything else that I have to do once I get home from work. I think back to my pre-child days and how lazy I was. I would get home from work and plonk in front of the telly and not really do much else at all.

This morning I set my alarm for around 6.30am, got up, got dressed and took the dog for a walk by myself. This allowed me to go for a longer walk and still be able to leave for work at the same time. It was a bit weird getting to the oval and doing some laps in the dark still but I thought to myself on the way home that I could get used to this. Not to be just yet I’m afraid as there’s no way I can leave JJ in the house by himself when I take Monty for a walk. All too soon, I guess that will happen but by then it might not be Monty I take for a walk but my next dog.

Having said that, I don’t want to wish my life, JJ’s life or my dog’s life away.

Part of the reason why I took this week off is to get some quotes to get a new window for my loungeroom. It’s taken me until this morning till the first person came around.

My current lounge room window is the original wooden sash window which doesn’t close properly at the top so I’ve stuffed the gap with some cloth nappies to try and stop the draft.

The flyscreen is screwed on so it doesn’t fall off, and the rendering at the side is coming away. So when I’ve got a new window I need to get the rendering fixed.

While trying to talk to the person at the office to tee up today I was already getting the sales pitch of, ‘We don’t advertise, so if you like our work..’.

I cut in, ‘I don’t give out my friends phone numbers for this sort of thing.’

‘Oh, no, that’s not what I mean. If you’re happy with our work then could you please tell people this.’

‘Sure, if I’m happy with the work you do, if I get you to do the job, I’ll be more than happy to spread the word.’

Then she said, ‘When you get the price, just tell the salesperson yes or no.’

I tried to say I wouldn’t be making a decision straight away, but JJ was yelling in my ear that he wanted to speak to whoever was on the phone so I never got the chance.

The salesperson came around this morning, measured up, wrote the original price down on some paper, crossed it out and put another price underneath it. Like I’m getting a really good deal.

The last time this type of thing happened to me I had Bramalco around here quoting me for a new roof, then he got on the phone to his boss and started rabbiting on how I’m in a high traffic area and the sign they put out the front after replacing my tin roof would be seen by lots of people so they could knock off a big chunk of money off the original quote. Yack yack yack, then he crossed out the over-inflated quote about one thousand dollars so it was down to about $4,000. He got off the phone and presented this to me and I sat there in disbelief that it would be sooo much and told him that this was my first quote and I wouldn’t be saying yes right now. The condition of this oh so fabulous price was that I accepted right here and now.

I said no I wouldn’t be accepting right now. I was going away shortly and wouldn’t be looking to do it right away anyway. He hassled me some more and then left without a yes from me.

Bramalco kept ringing me up and I told them once that I didn’t like their heavy handed sales tactics and these sort of tactics would just make me run a mile.

I ended up getting my roof replaced for $3000, ($1000 less than Bramalco’s ‘cheaper’ quote) and they did a fantastic job. They rang up if they were going to be late. They took away all the old tin. It was done in two days and I had absolutely no problems at all.

Back to my salesperson this morning. He reckons that the other aluminium windows I have are from them. I don’t know as they were here when I moved in. And their price is cheaper than the ballpark figure I got quoted a couple of days ago. They’re coming to do a proper measure up this afternoon. According to my man this morning, most of these people work on a commission, so immediately their quote will be more expensive.

Salespeople take note. I don’t like heavy handed sales and I hate a bullshit pitch and I can usually pick up a bullshit pitch a mile off. I like to feel that salespeople are being honest with me and if I feel that they’re not, I will not get them to do the job. If I don’t get them to do the job I will let them know, and I will let them know why not. And just because I’m getting one window done now, it doesn’t mean that I won’t be doing extensive renovations one day and re-employ them to do a larger, more expensive job, so don’t dismiss me because of that. Not that anyone has yet.