Wow, I could have sworn tons of people were out of work right now in this economy. You would think people would be jumping at the opportunity to make a couple grand right now. I guess, not so much. Remember when I mentioned that we should have 5 quotes by Monday to mull over? That didn’t happen. Here’s the lowdown of how things went.
Concrete Guy #1 – blew me off on Wednesday. I had a feeling in the puit of stomach he wasn’t going to show. He called while we were trying to put the new flusher on the basement toilet. He wanted to reschedule for Thursday or Friday. Well, I had an appointment with a client Thursday night so I told him I would probably be home all day on Friday. On Thursday night, after I called off for Friday, I sent him a text letting him know I wanted him to stop by tomorrow morning or afternoon. He didn’t text me until 5:45 p.m. Friday night after the sump pump took a dump I knew his prices were going to high and didn’t want to waste his time. I lied and said we had a sump pump emergency and now we couldn’t afford it. He was only for stamped concrete anyways
Concrete Guy #2 – Now this guy I was really excited about. He was a family friend and I was told the prices were going to be good. I spoke with him (well, if you call that speaking… he has the strongest Italian accent and I could barely understand him on the phone) on Tuesday and he was to come over Saturday morning. I canceled brunch with a friend, who I seriously need to catch up with, for this meeting. That morning, I drove frank to work, ran some errands and got home around 8:45. I had 45 minutes before I expected him, so I started cleaning my newly defrosted fridge. 9:30 came and went. I was pissed. He didn’t even call. Oh well, at least my cleaning momentum stuck with me and the house is spic n span!
Concrete Guy #3 – My mother, being the talker that she is, stopped a concrete guy (in the middle of a job) and talked to him about our project. She got a card and I called to schedule an estimate. The guy must have asked me to repeat my name 4 times and said he’d call back to set up an estimate. No call.
Our landscapers – never called me back
Paver Estimate – I was looking through Craig’s list and was able to email a guy pictures of our space with a description of what we wanted. He gave me a quick estimate that way, but it seems a bit high.
So now, I’ve lost another week and am not much farther than where I started. The good thing about all this waiting is the fact that we were able to really figure out what will be best for that space. When our one friend came over Friday to look at the sump pump, he said that pavers are the way to go. Turns out my cousin’s husband knows how to do this. So he is going to come spend the work week at our house next week (to save 2-3 hours in traffic during rush hour a day) and get it done.
I am so relieved to finally have a plan in motion. This week will be a bit hectic because we need to get a lot done. I want to see if I can get the landscapers to dig up the grass for us and then take the old pavers when we remove them. However, this would require me to actually get a hold of them. Then we will need to procure the permit with the village. Lastly, go select the pavers & set up the delivery.
I can’t wait to get this started! I really like the design of this one here, so I think this may be our inspiration!
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