Ask the painting contractor chickie.

Overly suspicious clients and dark secrets.

Because I get all my jobs via word of mouth "advertising", clients usually - and correctly - assume I'm not going to start going through their cupboards looking for things to steal, or riffling through their mail in search of dark secrets. Like many small contractors, I am given house keys, garage keypad and alarm codes or whatever I need to get into the house while the homeowners are at work. I can see being more cautious when it's a company hired through the yellow pages or something.

Mind you, I have inadvertently found a few "dark secrets." Like the time I pulled a stove out to paint behind it, and found several XXX videos stashed there. Gotcha Mister, your wife is an A-cup and you have all these busty babe videos, hahahaha. Or when spraying a basement ceiling, I noticed some papers on top of one of the joists, only visible from the ladder. When I climbed up to move them out of the way, I discovered a stack of bank statements in the husband's name only. Gotcha, again. Or the case of K-Y jelly under the bed in the master bedroom. No,I don't ever let on, to anyone! Or at least not in any way which would identify people.

However, every once in a while, someone will be unwilling to let me into the house in their absence, or will sort of follow me around while I work. I try not to take this personally and assume they're like this with everybody, but it is annoying and even unsettling. I had one client - years ago - who, once I got the job, gave me times I could be in the house working. "On Tuesday and Thursday I am at the gym until 11 am, so you can come to work then. Next Monday I won't be home, but you can be here at 9 am Tuesday." And so on. Good grief, that was a pain in the ass; had I known there were these restrictions I would've charged a lot more since it took me much longer to do the job! Plus, she followed me around - very nice people really, and she cooked nice lunches for me too. But still.
She must have decided I was trustworthy, at least sort of. They called me back the next year to give an estimate for painting the rest of the house, and I'm ashamed to say I fibbed and said I was terribly busy and it would be at least two months before I could do any work there, so they found someone else.

Once, we painted a condo for one of the Denver Broncos players - often in the news for altercations with his wife. Anyhow, we were told by the decorator that he had hidden cameras all over the place (trust issues with the wife, I'm guessing.) Boy, that'll make you awfully careful about saying or doing anything you don't want immortalised on tape! We were scared to scratch our butts, let alone make editorial comments on their choice of color, decor, reading material or contents of the medicine cabinet, haha. Actually no, I don't bother peeking in medicine cabinets either. I'm just not interested.
In the rare (it seems rare, any more) occurence I'm in a home where there's lots of books on bookshelves, I do scan them - I love books and reading & find it interesting to see what people read.

I talked to a cleaning lady once who said in every home she cleaned, she pretended there were cameras in every room and acted accordingly. I never thought of it that way - I'd feel paranoid, I think! But honestly I - and I imagine most trades type people - am there to work, I'm not going to waste my time going through personal effects. I've had people do work in my house, in my absence and haven't given it much thought. I suppose I would'nt leave wads of cash around if I didn't know them well, and if there was anything I really didn't want someone to see, I'd stash it, clean it up, whatever.

Actually if someone is very cagey, I wonder just what it is they are hiding. Once, years ago, we had a couple act funny about having this detached garage painted when we were painting the exterior. Turns out they were growing some weed in there, had grow lights and a nice little set up. Whatever. Now, if it had been a meth lab, I would have contacted The Authorities. Meth is nasty and bad and wrong. Pot? Ehhh, so what, go for it. It's been years since I got high - decades almost. I don't even drink any more, so there you are. Personal choice, I don't care if others do, even in my own house, as long as they're not hurting anyone else or getting obnoxious.

Actually, this just reminded me. Not too long ago, helper and I painted the whole interior of a house while the owners were on vacation. I love that - don't have to worry about inconveniencing people or leaving a mess at the end of the day, it's much easier. We pulled this big-ass, heavy bedroom dresser the size of a Buick away from the wall and found a big-ass sparkly ring wedged between the wall and the dresser. I left it on top. Turned out, it was big-ass expensive bling lost several years ago and they had given it up as gone forever.

Today is Sunday and I'm off to work. Lovely older couple with a beautiful back yard. I'm painting their kitchen cabinets, hallway and guest bath. Before I go there, I have to meet two helpers who are going to start stripping wallpaper in a humungous master bedroom and bath (my house could almost fit inside it) and set them up with ladders and a steamer and all that stuff. Best get going, it is going to be another long day...

posted by Carina @ 4:52 AM