JFife

Sorry about your thread, man. My bad. As far as I am concerned, you had a legendary 15seconds of fame if that is true about the Dio concert, LOL. Now if you tell me you were one of the guys in a Crue video holding a girl on your shoulders that is flashing the cameras, you may as well be on VH1:) I remember the rotating drumcage, during the 'Wildside" video. Tommy's skinny arms flailing like a madman as he sailed above the crowd.

sidetrack here Ken--but I'm going to see Motley Crue and Aerosmith in STL in October.....keep your eyes out for that one as well.

Ditto Russ's advice Travis. Great advice on the burlap, never heard that before. Three keys to RS: 1) moisture below 12%, 2) saturated surface, and 3) the longer you can wait between the saturations the better and more durable it will be (obviously, within reason). The best (which is not conducive to deck restoration, but for ultimate durability) would be to saturate, wait a week or so, and come back and re-coat. Since it is highly unlikely you want/need/bid/choose to do that, I'd apply a medium coat, and then come back and do it over again immediately. This would allow for about an hour between coats.

John, Not familiar with the product, I'd say there is an application issue. Call manufacturer, that will be the simplest solution. Not a problem I'd expect of the product in mention.

I've always found flushing to be overrated.

What's a 'stain paddle'??? Barry, dude, that is awesome!! Screw 90%, that looks great!! Couldn't be any better!

....I'll just have to catch up with you guys at Freaknik:) JH, eh?? Lived there for a spell myself, we'll have to talk sometime, JF

Well said Rod!! Selling is so cool---my grandpa (successful retired bank president) will only deal with a good salesperson. Few years ago he bought five Rainbow vacuums from a woman on a DTD to his home. I/we do DTD for log home stuff, but I don't view it as selling, but as marketing. It all goes in a database.

Chop Chop!!

Nothing like the feeling of that good sale. Nothing. Nothing I've experienced. A shot of adrenaline. I get pumped just watching that show on A&E, about the used car lot in Vegas.

Re: What Rod is saying about car quality, etc. I've tried LIKE CRAZY to make determinations like this, only to find none of them will hold true. I've had great customers have awful landscaping and painting. I'm not criticizing Rod--I am not above profiling in the least. Only Democrats call that 'profiling'--we call it "market analysis". I just TRULY have never found the shoe that fits. And I've come to believe you really do have to treat every bid/proposal equally, with the same vigor. I've had some nasty homes be darn good customers. And visaversa. Bad deal Aaron. Too bad it is an aquintance---kill 'em with kindness. NEW IDEA: Learned from sales tape. Guy sells steak knives doortodoor. He'd schedule an appt. with someone to meet them.....if he went (say, Tuesday at 9am) and they avoided him/weren't there (scared of being sold) he'd just leave. He'd come back the NEXT DAY at 9am and shamefully and sorrowfully apologize to the lady, and say, "ma'am, I mis-read my calander. I didn't realize it until this morning, but I was actually supposed to be here yesterday. I owe you a tremendous apology. Would you accept my apology, and could we go ahead and meet now and discuss those steak knives you were interested in???" This salesman said it sold 100% of time and here is why: If the person was honest, and said "no, I intentionally stood you up" then he wouldn't get a sale, but that RARELY happened. Most are faaaar to passive. ALMOST EVERYONE would say, "oh, don't worry about it, we can meet now". He knew at that point, if they were too passive to be honest about what they'd done, there was no way they were going to be able to resist a powerful, polished, presentation from an expert salesman. When this happened, he made a sale 100% of the time. This guy's name was Judge Ziglar, Zig's brother and is the all-time record holder for knive sales in the country. Pretty cool I thought:)

Hey! You came over from ContractorTalk! First off, I am far less worried about your water supply than I am about your back if you are planning on unloading this thing out of a truckbed. I think for that GPM, you are going to be stuck with a water tank at some point....don't see a way around that.

Aaron, If i may critique you though, this doesn't sound like a Williamson Co. house, or a WillCo customer. Or GH, BelleMeade (target zones). For this to have been the response, at the PROPOSAL OF BID, you obviously didn't weed-out aggressively enough. I bet it was a YP call. You have to be aggressive in weeding these out....point them out to pics on your website and say, "is your house about this size? Oh yes, this was a great project, they were thrilled. You can call them as a referral. We did X, X, X, X, and X, all for $6,800 on this home, which is a great value for a high-end Co. like ours." The good customers will just ignore this and say, "i'd like for you to stop by when you get a chance," the bad ones will say, "it's gonna cost that much? I didn't realize that." At that point, say, "well, knowing this is the price range we are in, are we wasting each others time to pursue with an estimate? I realize quality service isn't cheap, but what are your options?" If they say, "come on", there is a good chance they are a buyer and were setting you up with the "dang that's high" remark. If they are a gentleman and cannot/will not afford it, they'll pass. If they are true white trash, they'll still ask you to come, and tell you it is ten times higher than they want. Tough to weed those out.:)

....More than fair. Call her back and apologize and say, "I am sooooo sorry ma'am, I got the numbers wrong, the actual total is more like $2100.00. I thought it looked funny, but it wasn't until you hung up on me that I figured out what I did wrong on my pricing. At that price, would you like to shedule for Sept. 15?" Then call on Sept. 15 and re-schedule for Oct. 10. Do this a couple more times, and finally call her back and say, "you know what, I went back over the numbers, and I was actually right the first time. So are you still interested in getting it done at $5800.??" ....Or you could just call them at around 3am and say, "hey I'm sorry, we got cut off earlier today...probably my cell phone. I didn't get to complete my proposal about restoring your deck." Probably best just not to sweat it. Just be glad you aren't married to her--it could be worse.

...Probably for cattle and the like. LOTS of money in semen. Interestingly, however, you cannot sell horse semen (at least not at the "high end" market). That is the whole problem with that fella who broke his leg at Preakness (I believe), he had just won the Kentucky Derby (dang, cannot think of his name). Most horses you have to put down after a leg injury--they simply cannot heal. But him--he is worth millions---as a stud. Thing is, they have to pork the old-fashioned way, no injections. So they are spending un-told dollars on him (Barbaro?) to get his leg healthy enough to simply mount some mares, and the owners can get their payday. Well, that is your lesson in Equine Ejaculate 101 for the day:)

Honestly, I think that is just the price you pay for being in a year-round work zone. People in Michigan and New Hampshire are fretting in August, people in the Durty are chillin'. When Feb. comes and Ken Fenner is complaining about eating beans and cornbread at every meal because he is broke, you ATL guys can smile and show him the new platinum fronts you just got from all the housewashing you've been doing, :) It's all a cycle, be happy, this is Darwinism thinning out the herd,

Ashland!! They always have the cheapest gas!! Exit 40 I believe?? Is that right? Remember that from driving so much from TN to home in STL. Integrity: points well made. As I think we all agree, Mike's decision, and there are variables that we don't know which should be considered. I'm not going to post on this anymore, because as I said, it's Mike's call. But my only point I'd want to be considered as a Christian is that, being a Christian does not imply that you have to be weak, or taken advantage of. I believe many use this as a crutch of sorts to keep from having to be bold--it is easier to just say, "I'll just love them anyways and hope they stop." A quick study of the Bible will show that Christians are anything but weak--and you shouldn't be ashamed to defend yourself. How is it "loving your other neighbors" to let these people go around menacing and terrorizing others in the neighborhood/city, without trying to stop them?? ....Or conversely, maybe your stopping these "kids" or whoever by whatever means necessary stops them from going to Hotshot's house and getting shot or something??

The RIGHT thing for you to do is protect you family, at all costs. Not defending yourself in this action is a show of weakness, one that a predator will prey upon. I grew up on a back road at the bottom of the hill, two working parents. During my childhood, we were broke into FOUR TIMES. I assure you, you don't want to find out what that will do to make your families life worse, more fearful, etc. This might be petty, but it is theft nonetheless and a form of terror if you ask me. If I were you, I'd try to catch them in the act, and do something that might be defined as "crazy", and get that reputation as opposed to "easy target" or "harmless". Make sure this stops HERE....I can still remember being a kid and coming home from school with my mom and seeing the front door cracked open, and her just dropping two bags of groceries to the ground in shock. I'd do something overly-protective now...and worry about the fallout later.

Scott, Yeah, I was just interested if they named her "Reagan" after his acting accomplishments as opposed to his political accomplishments. You guys ever see, "IT" by Stephen King?? That clown had fangs. And lived in the drains.

"Hills have Eyes"...isn't that Horror?? I may check it out. Don't really like scary stuff. Especially hate creepy stuff. Watched an episode of HBO's "Carnivale" and I still have nightmares. Clowns [shiver]. ...Now if you want to rent something good, get the first season of "PrisonBreak". Literally, I stayed up until 5am three nights this week watching it. Unbelievably good. Like, "24" good.

The theory "credit" is rediculous. My parents have never paid a bill late in their life, never had a card balance, paid cash for their home, etc......and for that.......their credit score is "good". The trick to a good credit score is that you need to borrow lots of money, pay it back, and have lots of unused cash available on credit cards. Craziness. I feel for ya Kentucky. One of the wealthiest guys I know personally, was bankrupt at about your age, and at 50, was a multi-multi. The one thing bankruptcy cannot ruin is YOU; meaning, in my friend's instance, he had people that NEW he could make it, and investing money in HIM was a wise decision. Paid off for him, and paid off for investors. Anyone that feels that way about you?? (not family, friends, IMO) I went to college with this guy's kids, and he was a well-known alumni; I'll see if I can find a story about him and I'll email it to you. You might read "Guerrilla Marketing" and "Guerrilla Selling" lots of stuff in there to do for free. My advice would ALWAYS be to go for networking. Realtors. Painters. Etc.

Neil, ...sorry to interrupt, but your wife/girlfriend's name is "Reagan"?!?!? WOW! That is awesome!! I imagine she is too old to have been named after the President, but was she named after RR, the actor?? If I ever have a child, I'm going to name them, "Cheney", boy or girl.:) Movie: That's funny, my bro went and saw it, walked out half-way. Huge Farrell fan too. My dad also hated it. We aren't southerners/nascar'ers....would that make a difference??

Well played Camalot,