Volume 9: Back to Basics

Enough with all the doom, gloom and sentimentality of it all, this edition of the newsletter has something the previous volumes have been well short on: Comedy.

Good evening River People Rebuild Readers or RPRRs,

My apologies for the late posting of this one. I don’t have an excuse (I used most of those for the previous eight volumes), but please know, I did try to get this one out on time, but once again, life got in the way.

I know in a previous newsletter, I talked about how the Bilskis had completely rebuilt. Well, it turns out I was wrong. I forgot about the second floor carpeting. Technically, we didn’t lose all our carpeting to the flood — just the first five or six steps — but rather than doing just the steps, we opted to do the entire upstairs.

Overall, the carpeting company we used was fantastic work- and product-wise. But they or, specifically, the woman who handled the logistics of the whole operation, left a lot to be desired on the communication side of things. I’m not going to get into all the details, but here are the main bullet points:

• Put down a deposit and was told the carpet would be ready in four weeks tops. Eight weeks later (with zero phone calls or emails about the delay), my wife calls and finds out they may be able to “get in over the next two weeks.”

• Told us they were coming at 10 and instead showed up promptly at 7:45 a.m. with no call about being early (Liz and I were up until 2 the night before moving all of the furniture).

• Told us they could take the old carpet with them when they left and then, right before they went to leave, proceeded to tell us there was a mix-up and they actually couldn’t take the carpet. By the time I could find a place to take the older carpet, it got drenched in a downpour, and I had to load up the Forrester (see above pic) with sopping, stinking old carpet and covertly dispose of it in the dumpsters at my mother in law’s apartment complex.

Before paying the remainder of the invoice, I saw a golden opportunity to get back into a passion of mine that has, unfortunately, taken a back seat in recent years. I blame the kids. And the job. And Judith, my Boston Terrier and her insatiable appetite for playing fetch with tennis balls. And also the fact that there are so many amazing guitar riffs to half learn, and so little time. Regardless of the excuses, I haven’t been dedicating nearly enough of my time and energy to sending crank/prank emails — like a crank phone call only without the intimacy of a voice at the other end of the line. Crank emailing is a subtle art that takes a lot of practice. It’s also essentially the format I used to begin writing in the first place. I can’t even tell you people the pure, childlike job I derive from getting a response to one of my batshit crazy emails. Readers, if you’re unfamiliar with my beloved collection of virtual pranks, here are a few of my favorites from the archive:

• Once I tried to convince a poetry magazine that my wife improved Robert Frost’s most famous poem, and the fine folks at Points in Case were nutty enough to publish it on their website.

• For Liz’s 30th birthday, I took her to the Signature Room on the 56th floor of the John Hancock Center in Chicago. It was overpriced, but well worth this email exchange with the director of operations for the restaurant.

• A few years back, I discussed how my off-label Viagra usage may interfere with my ability to run a marathon. You can read that one here.

• I had a nice conversation with the manager of the Red Roof Inn (Wilkes-Barre) about the likelihood of farm animals getting into one of the rooms.

• Here’s a fun interaction with a Comcast rep and, one of my personal favorites,

• A discussion with a DJ about a unique event.

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Alternative Payment Methods

Sorry for the long tangent back there, but it was just my rambling way of leading up to this recent semi-crank email I sent to the carpet lady about the remainder of our invoice. Stay tuned — I’ll post the response here:

Jared Bilski <jrdbilski@gmail.com>
12:03 AM (23 hours ago)

to XXXXXXXX

Hi XXXXXXXX,

10-4 on the invoice for the remainder of our balance. We will get that out to you as soon as possible. I noticed the bill said the terms of the bill were Net 30. It's been a little while since I took one of those basic accounting classes, but I'm assuming net 30 still means 30 days after (i.e., in victus) the first Sunday of the fiscal year minus seven, right? In that case, our bill is due by August 7th at the latest, correct? Please confirm.

(Note to readers before reading the next chunk: They never said they could take payment in the form of NFTs. In fact, they even hate to deal with credit cards.)

Also, thanks again for accepting the balance of our payment in the form of a Non-Fungible Token (NFT). I was initially surprised when you said that you took this form of payment, but I'm glad to see you're embracing the future and this open arms approach to alternative payment options will no doubt put you world's ahead of your competition. I'm guessing we're far from your only customers who are paying via an NFT (via an Eth token I'm guessing, correct?), but this really helps us out of a bind. See, with inflation being what it is, most of our liquidity is currently tied up in Yen. I know, I know, you and everybody else, mister. But seriously, thanks for being so flexible about your payment options. I'll be sure to give your company a shout on my crypto blog, Big Bitcoin Balls (a play on the mid-20th century colloquialism Big Brass Balls).

Anyway, a couple of quick customer feedback notes:

1. Your product is outstanding and the craftmanship of the installers is legit. The day after the carpet was installed, I did my own product test and stripped down to the Speedo I wore to my high school state swim championship back in 2000 and rolled around on the new carpet like a dog in heat. I learned earlier on that in order to truly get a feel for the quality of the carpet, this was the only way to do it -- and your carpet did not disappoint!

2. A couple of your guys said they would take the old carpet with them when they left, and then, when the job was over, they reversed course and said they weren't able to take it. That placed us in quite the pickle and we had no choice but to dump the old carpet in the your facility's dumpster after hours -- just kidding! I loaded my Forrester with that sopping mess and unloaded it at my MIA's apartment.

3. On the second day, you told us you were going to be there at 10 a.m., but instead your crew showed up at 8 without any warning. This wouldn't have been much of a big deal except for the fact that my wife and I were up until 4 in the morning moving the furniture so your team could lay the carpet the next day. Four hours of sleep is not enough for this Polish empath, and thanks to the sleep deprivation, I make some questionable investment decisions that day.

Thanks again and let me know if you have any questions about the NFT specifics, but I'm guessing you've worked out the kinks with this payment option by now!!

Pura Vida,

Jared the Jackrabbit (my high school swim team's nickname for me) and Liz Bilski

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Til Next Time,
Jared