I got back today from the One Heart retreat I went to for YFC. It was interesting. I might blog on that another time soon, but there is a more pressing story that must be told. It occured about six hours ago, and I first told my tale for a group of fine young ladies, one of which looked like she was about to pop some Marta tokens out of her belly button, she was laughing so hard.
I was at home earlier, preparing for some clients to come over to preview a video. I heard the doorbell ring and noticed they were about 20 minutes early. As I open the door, it's not them. It's some dude who has the appearance of a man who has been working on a car for the past few hours. He explains to me in a rehersed manner that he is selling a cleaner. He asks me if I have any kids. No. Any pets? No. He tells me I am a smart man. He asks what the hardest thing for me to clean is. I don't know. This whole situation reminds me of Deb in Napoleon Dynamite trying to sell glamour shots and beaded bracelets.
He pulls out his squirt bottle. "Here, watch this clean your wall." He squirts the dirty paneling on my house and rubs it with a towel. It smudges and rubs off some of the loose dirt. "See, it removes oil and grime." "Here check this out." He pulls out a Sharpie and another towel. The towel has a mark of Sharpie already on it (which tells me already that this demonstration will also leave a lot to be desired). He draws on the towel. Squirt, squirt. And he rubs it. The thin black sharpie mark, magically becomes a blob of a grey mark on the towel. "See how that works, it's like a Shout strip, but Shout won't take out Sharpie." "Is that your car?" He asks, as he points to my roommate's car. I almost want to say yes and see if he's going to draw on the car with his Sharpie. I say no.
He asks me again what the hardest thing to clean in my house is. I still don't have an answer, but he goes ahead and informs me that I can clean grease build ups or glass or pretty much anything with this product held before me. In fact with just a few cap fulls diluted in water, I can clean all my carpeting with a steam cleaner.
He gets back to the car thing again, "which car is yours?" I point to it. We walk over and he asks what the dirtiest thing is about the car, I respond sarcastically, "the car", enjoying making fun of him, but still losing my patience. He asks if there are any stains. I inform there are, but they are rather old. He seems very up for the challenge, scoffing at these old stains. My passenger side seat, stain found, squirt squirt. He pulls out his towel, covered in grime from a day of testing. He searches the towel for a clean spot and finds a tiny corner, which he wipes on the spot maybe twice (this guy doesn't put a lot of effort into his presentation in any way). "See, look at this." He shows me a brown on his rag from my chair. I don't know if it was the stain actually, I think it was just proof of how dirty my car is.
He's not done, he starts rooting through my car in search of stains. He is lifting up my floor mats, where he suspects there could be a nice hidden stain. He finds one the size of half a pea. Squirt squirt. Rubbing with the towel. Can he tell I'm not impressed yet?
He stands up outside my car and talks some more. Noticing my roof he says, "You have oxidation on your roof here. If I could take that off, how many bottles would you want to buy?"
I tell him I'm probably not interested. We find our way back to my porch. He asks me again how many bottle I'd be interested in buying (all still with the inflection of a Napoleon Dynamite character). At that moment my neighbor pulls up and is a little confused by who this man is. I quickly introduce her and tell her his purpose. I find my way back into the house to let her deal with this guy.
It's fun to meet new people!
