No- shows..... again

[Fenton Murray]

Yea Nick,
I am always reassured in this day of technology when standing on a porch I dial a number (dial?) on my cell phone and hear a phone ringing in the house.
I used to work for a piano rental company, Earl Gardner, back some 30 years. Anyway, a client had not paid in months if not years and never was home when we were out with the truck. Then one evening the light was on and we knocked on the door. There was the piano right where we had delivered it some years back, the same piano but different people. Earl let them know that was his piano and he wanted it back, these people said no way it theirs and we'd best be leaving or they'd call the cops. Anyway, somehow Earl makes his way in with the contract to prove the piano is his, he lifts the lid to see the serial number, they were right, it was their piano. Same brand, same place, different channel.
Fenton
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Nick Gravagne 
  To: 'Pianotech List' 
  Sent: Friday, August 01, 2008 3:47 PM
  Subject: RE: No- shows..... again


  Amazing no-show (kind of):

   

  Many years ago when I lived in Albuquerque a brand new customer and I agreed that if she wasn't home she would leave the door unlocked and that I could just go in and tune her grand piano. Since I tuned for her Church and other friends she trusted me to take care of business in the event of her absence. Well, I arrived and knocked at the door - no answer. Rand the doorbell, more nothing. I tentatively tried the doorknob - not locked. It's hard not to feel creepy in these situations, but I gingerly entered the house and found a mahogany grand piano. Still, I lamely called out something like, "Hello, anybody home - I'm the piano tuner." The sound of silence was deafening. 

   

  So, I tuned the piano completely undisturbed; left my card and bill and moved on with the day.

   

  That evening and a phone call from my customer. She wants to know what happened; she was there for our appointment and I never showed up. I assured her that I had, and that no one was home and that I tuned her mahogany piano in the living room. Trouble is, her piano is ebony and it lives in the studio, not the living room. A mystery now. We made another appointment for the following day and I had dinner that night, sitting wide eyed, sure I had entered into the Twilight Zone.

   

  Later that evening and the phone rings. A man identified himself, but all I really heard was "I don't know who asked you to tune my piano, but it sounds great and thanks. I will get a check in the mail tomorrow."  Of course he wanted to know more, who put me up to it and so on. I asked the man for his address and I wrote it down, and when we hung up, I checked it against my appointment book, and as they say in the South, "I like to fell down." I had the correct house number but was on the wrong street! And the street names were similar; they had a theme, such as Cedar, Spruce, and Cider. Well, somewhere along the way, when I was looking for Cedar I ended up on Cider two blocks away, and with no appointment walked into the house of a perfect stranger, tuned a mahogany grand, and managed to get paid!

   

  What are the odds?!! Later that night I imagined all sorts of weird and wild scenarios that might have happened, but thankfully did not. I'll leave it to the rest of you to think about. I also wondered how I could possibly justify such an unbelievable tale to my new customer with the ebony grand, who I "stood up". It turns out she believed me, and sort of knew the other party. We laughed.

   

  Who could forget such an odd story? Still, I learned to never walk into a strange house unless I was absolutely and completely sure of the address; or better yet, if I had never been there before to simply not go in, or even try the doorknob for fear that on the other side of that door might stand, cigarette in hand, Rod Serling.

   

   

   

  Nick Gravagne, RPT

  Piano Technicians Guild

  Member Society Manufacturing Engineers

  Voice Mail 928-476-4143

   


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  From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of pianolady50 at peoplepc.com
  Sent: Friday, August 01, 2008 1:02 PM
  To: Pianotech List
  Subject: Re: No- shows..... again

   

  Best No Show (for me)

   

  The job involved removing the 'drawer' in a Recordo grand to bring in to the shop for rebuild.  The customer lived an hour and a half away (one way) in a gated community south of Tampa, FL.  She had told me that she would be meeting her husband at the airport, but that she would leave my name with the guard at the gate, and the house key would be under the front mat.

   

  Seeing as I knew extra hands would be useful in the drawer removal, my dad accompanied me on the trip.  

   

  (Can you anticipate what happened?)

   

  After battling our way through Tampa and hauling down the east side of Tampa Bay to Symphony Isles (no kidding), we arrived at the guard shack.  Pleasant older man emerged and I announced my name, my customer's name, and my purpose for being there.  He hadn't a clue.  The customer had forgotten to tell him.  How frustrating to be sitting there, knowing that just several streets away was that house key waiting for me.

   

  We drove the hour and a half back home and I immediately called the customer getting her answering machine.  I left a pleasant, chiding message.  She called back that evening to apologize and I could hear her husband, in the background, kiddingly giving her grief.  We made a new appointment and she assured me that the guard would be told.  I asked for the phone number at the guard shack!   I called him before I headed out to her house, and every time in the future. 

   

  Debbie L.

     
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