The other evening we had a Kirby vacuum salesman knock on our door. He offered to shampoo an entire room of carpet for FREE. So, of course, I let him in. RIGHT AWAY. (Have you seen my carpet lately? ick.)
But Husband got all worried. He started making rogue phonecalls to the neighbors and put his baseball bat in the hall closet. You know, just in case the Kirby vacuum salesman turned out to be a raging psychotic killer or something.
And you thought I was the paranoid one.
After he decided that the guy was a real salesman and not a raging murderer, Husband started feeling bad about having him clean our carpet when we knew we'd never buy the vacuum. But I'll give it to the sales guy - he was persistent. We had to say no about 50 times during the course of that cleaning. Even when he discounted the $3,000 vacuum down to $1,000 with no payments until April, we still said no.
Husband kept saying, "I feel guilty making you clean - we're really not going to buy anything."
And I kept jabbing him in the ribs and muttering under my breath, "Shhhhh, maybe if we keep him talking he'll do the hall too."
He didn't do the hall.
We didn't get the vacuum.
But hey, now I don't even have to rent a rug dr from Albertsons. And I feel only half as grossed out making my kids crawl around on our not-as-grungy-as-it-used-to-be living room carpet.
Speaking of salesmen...
Once this one guy tried to sell me some all purpose cleaner. He was making the point that it was non-toxic, with an opening of "Watch this!" and then he pulled out the tube that goes inside the spray bottle and licked it. (A big slobbery lick.)
It wasn't the best first impression.
I thought he was a little nuts.
And also it was gross.
But it got grosser. Because then he smeared his forehead sweat all over our window and showed me how he could clean it off.
And then when I wouldn't buy it, he tried to pull the "I think I'm attractive so I can surely woo you into buying it by feeding you cheesy lines" routine.
Yeah. I'm a married, 30 year old, overweight mother of 4. Cheesy lines? Right, that'll totally work.
So finally I told him he had to get off our doorstep because I had to get ready to go out that night.
And he said, "Oh cool- to a club or something?"
And I said, "My cousin and I are going to go see the new Harry Potter IN 3D!!"
I think that must have been some kind of magic phrase. Because he was no longer licking anything, feeding me cheesy lines or wiping sweat on my house. He just left. Thank goodness.
Nerdiness saved the day. Again.
I'm thinking of getting a "No Soliciting" sign for our front door. Except it would need to have an additional clause, so it would look more like this:
NO SOLICITING
(unless you're cleaning carpets - because I have a hall that needs done)
(and please don't lick anything while you're here)
But Husband got all worried. He started making rogue phonecalls to the neighbors and put his baseball bat in the hall closet. You know, just in case the Kirby vacuum salesman turned out to be a raging psychotic killer or something.
And you thought I was the paranoid one.
After he decided that the guy was a real salesman and not a raging murderer, Husband started feeling bad about having him clean our carpet when we knew we'd never buy the vacuum. But I'll give it to the sales guy - he was persistent. We had to say no about 50 times during the course of that cleaning. Even when he discounted the $3,000 vacuum down to $1,000 with no payments until April, we still said no.
Husband kept saying, "I feel guilty making you clean - we're really not going to buy anything."
And I kept jabbing him in the ribs and muttering under my breath, "Shhhhh, maybe if we keep him talking he'll do the hall too."
He didn't do the hall.
We didn't get the vacuum.
But hey, now I don't even have to rent a rug dr from Albertsons. And I feel only half as grossed out making my kids crawl around on our not-as-grungy-as-it-used-to-be living room carpet.
Speaking of salesmen...
Once this one guy tried to sell me some all purpose cleaner. He was making the point that it was non-toxic, with an opening of "Watch this!" and then he pulled out the tube that goes inside the spray bottle and licked it. (A big slobbery lick.)
It wasn't the best first impression.
I thought he was a little nuts.
And also it was gross.
But it got grosser. Because then he smeared his forehead sweat all over our window and showed me how he could clean it off.
And then when I wouldn't buy it, he tried to pull the "I think I'm attractive so I can surely woo you into buying it by feeding you cheesy lines" routine.
Yeah. I'm a married, 30 year old, overweight mother of 4. Cheesy lines? Right, that'll totally work.
So finally I told him he had to get off our doorstep because I had to get ready to go out that night.
And he said, "Oh cool- to a club or something?"
And I said, "My cousin and I are going to go see the new Harry Potter IN 3D!!"
I think that must have been some kind of magic phrase. Because he was no longer licking anything, feeding me cheesy lines or wiping sweat on my house. He just left. Thank goodness.
Nerdiness saved the day. Again.
I'm thinking of getting a "No Soliciting" sign for our front door. Except it would need to have an additional clause, so it would look more like this:
NO SOLICITING
(unless you're cleaning carpets - because I have a hall that needs done)
(and please don't lick anything while you're here)
Comments
And I have never had anyone lick anything while they were here. ugh.
and (in all honesty) I almost called the cops on the last Kirby guy... would. not. LEAVE my house... ManOfTheHouse was saying "no" - I was saying "no", and finally he left when I threatened to file a sexual harassment claim with his company (after some extremely poor choice of words in his sales pitch)