On 27 Dec 2004 07:04:33 GMT, (GTO69RA4) wrote:

I'm sure a lot of people know what I'm talking about. Getting known among
friends as the guy with weird hobbies and tools. A good buddy pulls up today
with his snowblower, says it broke and he remembers I had a welder. So being in
a not-completely-antisocial mood I help him out. Just as I'm about to start it
starts snowing hail the size of peas, then blowing sideways. Everything gets
covered with the white stuff, and after having trouble starting I finally get
it done. Then he happens to mention that his blower wasn't actually running,
and he heard I knew engines...

One comment I'd like to add to this thread is that it's not always a
good idea to do business with close friends of the family. I recently
did (paid) work for a neighbor quite awhile back and only recently
found out that he was severely ****ed off at all of us because he had
expected something different from what the work was stated to be. I
knew there would be problems because I tried to explain that I
couldn't do what he wanted, and that the other company that was going
to finish his project would have to do it since they had the tools to
do it properly, but I would do the other half of it at a lower rate
than them. He nodded yes to all of that but didn't truly understand
what I was talking about, so he stayed under the assumption that I had
done it, and since he didn't allow for the extra time or cost, he
missed a deadline and lost money on his project. If he had simply
called me I would have at least tried to set things straight, but he
never mentioned it to anyone until recently. So from now on I refuse
to do projects either free or paid for anyone who's that close to the
family. It's not worth the sitcom-drama.