Le Visage

Yeah, I know. I haven't shown you the front of the house yet. I promise that I will, in the next couple of days.

But for now, how about a blast from the past?
<-------------





This photo was taken somewhere around 2001, as far as I can tell.

Nasty-awning-ness aside, I can't help but notice that my little housey-house actually HAD A STORM DOOR in this photo.

Whoooooooooooooooooo took it?

Ah well. Whatevah. At least that barf-blue had already been ameliorated by the time I adopted my favorite little orphan-cottage in 2006... and I'm happy to report that the foliage did not actually EAT the house, as one might presume from this picture.

To be continued..........................

Forest, prairie-grass, kelly, seafoam...

...whatever the particular shade of green, you can bet on it being found at Villa Ranty.


Here are a few on the front porch. Once again, this is not completely staged. I'm going to scrub it up a bit more, add throw pillows to the chairs and a table lamp for good measure.







Sadly, I don't have a before shot of the porch. I screwed up on that. It looked crappy though - take my word for it. I scrubbed, patched, caulked and repainted the entire thing, down to the floorboards. (After scraping the old linoleum and 1930s newsprint off, that is.)










And I guess it's about time I showed you this.
(interior view)
<--------- Hrmph.








(exterior view)

I'm thinking of painting that new-frame wood in the rusty-red color that I have on the porch floor. The reason is that I want to detract from the obnoxiously mis-matched greens of the door and surrounding woodwork.

Worth a try anyway, eh?

Emco Storm Door - YOU SUCK!!!

Those of you who have been following this blog are -of course- familiar with the storm door saga.

But wait - there's new news:

This Emco 400 Traditional Self-Storing Storm Door , for which I waited forty days, is in fact A COMPLETE PIECE OF GARBAGE.

First of all, it's made of fucking tin foil. The thing was dented inside the box. Later, I think I sneezed, and it dented again... badly.

Second of all, if you look at the product description, there's a line that reads as follows:

Security

• Deadbolt with keyed lock is built into the door frame.

WTF, you sneaky bastards! It is NOT built in!

How is this, you ask? I'll tell you how: The door comes flat, with no hardware on it. Not only is there no hardware on it, but you have to actually drill your own holes in the tin foil in order to install THE HANDLE and LOCK.

Hello??? Gimme a hole, at least? Please? A drawn-on guide? Something????

Third, due to the aforementioned tin foil quality, my door was totally warped. That is to say, when in a closed and locked position, one could still slip a UPS parcel into my porch via the ridiculous gap at the top of this craptastic door's frame.

I tried to bend it back, and almost broke the glass insert. Evidently the components are secured with bubble gum and tape.

Oh, and this door retails for $360 at Home Depot, in case you were wondering.

*spit*

FORTY days

July 10, 2007

Customer Relations
Home Depot
2455 Paces Ferry Road
Atlanta, GA 30339

To Whom it May Concern:

I am writing to follow up on a customer service issue at the Minneapolis Home Depot, about which I contacted your offices last week. (Original letter attached for reference.)

Last Thursday, I hand-delivered my letter to Matt Virnig, and he called me shortly thereafter. While he did apologize for the problems I had encountered as well as offer to send me a $100 gift card, I was disturbed to hear that he had no idea what was going on with my missing storm door. He informed me that he had an employee waiting on hold with the vendor of the product, and that he would call me by the end of the day.

He never called back.

On Friday, July 6, I called the store and was told that Mr. Virnig was not answering his phone. I asked for his voicemail, and the operator told me that he doesn't have any. (How does the manager of an entire store not have voicemail???) I left a message with the operator, asking Mr. Virnig to call me, which he still has not, as of Tuesday, July 10.

This extreme lack of basic customer service is truly mind-boggling, and I do intend to share this story with my friends and industry colleagues so that they may be spared such aggravation by shopping elsewhere.

Sincerely,

[Ranty]
Real Estate Agent & Investor

CC: Matt Virnig, Store Manager
Home Depot
1520 New Brighton Blvd
Minneapolis, MN 55413

Enc: 1

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Post-script:

When I got home today at 5:30pm, there was a message on the answering machine stating that my door had arrived and was ready for pickup. (NOT by Matt Virnig, mind you.)

I'm still sending this letter, goddammit.

39 Days and counting...

STILL.

NO.

DOOR.










Kill me now.

Yes, I know, it's another picture-less post

I've barely had time to shower in the past month, much less photograph anything, okay???

Image updates on the house are coming soon, I swear.

In the meantime, let me just ramble for a moment about how today was the LAST DAY of pre-licensure education, so it's happily back to rantyworld - sleeping late and slacking off - yehawww!

Um, that is to say, unless you would like to hire me as your Realtor... in which case I would [of course!] adopt a 5AM-11PM daily schedule in order to most expeditiously sell your house or locate the future home of your dreams.

*cough*

Anyway...

On to the next tidbit of the day:

Remember the door? The stupid-effing-storm door that cost over $400 and took 4 weeks to be delivered???

Well, the Home Depot dude told me of an alternate door, made by Anderson, which 1) looked like it belonged in a gold-toothed grandma's trailer house or perhaps a stylish new modular home in Coon Rapids, 2) did NOT come in black but rather 4 other vomitous color options, BUT 3) could arrive in 10 days.

Obviously, I bought it.

Time is of the essence, right?

But the funny thing is this: if buying a stupid, sub-par storm door isn't enough to show you all what an idiot I am, here's something more: I called about the door yesterday (13 days past ordering) and was informed that ghetto-door has "a 28-day lead time."

WTF?!?!

Some little Home Depot wank door-salesguy is most definitely getting his ass kicked tomorrow.

I think it will be a fitting re-introduction in to construction-worker-life after three+ long weeks of nicey-nice real estate environment. :-)