Thread: Interview with a real live Witch

Tweet

I WISH!


I mentioned this a bit on 'What did you find/buy today?' But I thought I'd back up and give you the whole story, including an update on the situation since I last posted...




Well this is a tale that needs a bit of setup, so have a seat...

Now then, where to start? Well many of you here know that I love to go 'all-out' when it comes to decorating outside our home for the holidays, especially Halloween. (At last as 'all-out' as I can afford on a VERY limited budget.) Anyway, it's my 20th 'Haunteversary' so I wanted to do some serious upgrades to my graveyard display. I contacted a fellow who's been at it at least as long as I have,if not longer, (jdubbya) and he knows how to use power tools. He's building me some fence panels, the kind that look like wrought iron.

So I wanted to have an garden arch/arbor front and center as the 'entrance' to my graveyard. I found an ad on Craigslist, fo a large and small white lattice arbor, at $15 & $20 dollars respectively. She wrote 'plastic', but after seeing the fence in her front yard, I think she means 'vynil'. A hell of a deal, so I call her, fingers crossed, because it was an ad for a 'moving sale' that was posted on June 26th. As it urned out, she did still have them both and was willing to sell them to me at that price.

To which I thought 'great!, sadly the third party I contacted to help me haul away my haul got sick and could not help. She had since moved out, but was still willing to work things out. She told me that she had a tenant who was living there, to protect his identity, let's call him 'Toad'.

Frances (the seller) gave me his cel # and told me to contact him so that he could 'let me onto the property' to look at, pay for, and eventually haul away the arbors. That seemed reasonable and easy enough, and it should also have been my first clue that it was going to be anything but.

For 3 days I left 8 separate messages, which he never returned. Apparently Toad, doesn't feel the need to either answer his phone, or check/return any messages he receives. So this morning (Tuesday the 10th, actually) I had an appointment at the local VA Hospital, which is about 7 or 8 blocks from the house where Toad is renting. So I take the bus to the Va, and once I finish there, I take the bus back the way I came, but get off about 4 or 5 blocks from Toad's house. (*SIGH* This is starting to sound like a 'lost' episode of the 'Super Mario Bros. Super Show')

Anyway, I get there and ring and knock 3 or 4 times, no response. I check the address and take a peek at the mail in the mailbox, both of which confirm that I'M at the right address. So I sit down on the front stoop, take a few swigs of soda and take out my notebook from my backpack, and write a pair of notes for Toad. One to put between the screen door and the door frame, and the other to put under the wiper blades of the car in the driveway. (Apparently belonging to the seller, Frances, not Toad.) I then wrote out a 'receipt' for Toad to sign, just on the off chance that He'd show up before I left.

I got there about 1pm, and by the time I finished writing all that, about 20-30 minutes later, someone did show up, but it wasn't Toad, or Frances. It was a blonde haired woman who stepped out of a little sub-compact sized SUV. She kind of reminded me of...

Susan Sullivan, whom played Kitty Montgomery, Greg's mom on 'Dharma and Greg' but more as I'd imagine her today, as opposed to back in '97 when the above pic was taken.The thing of it is after talking to her for just 5-10 minutes, I was convinced that she was possessed by the spirit of...


I kid you not! She had to be THE most self-absorbed, self-righteous, self-centered person that I'd ever had the misfortune of having met. Oh it started out pleasant enough, at least 'at first'. She asked me what I was doing, fair enough, so I told her I was waiting to see Toad, er Todd. She informed me that he wasn' t here. I went on to identify myself and briefly explain my reason for being here (she never DID identify herself , or her 'relationship' to Toad) As I did so, a glimmer of recognition crept across her craggy, weatherbeaten features. She went on to tell me that she'd heard from Toad that I had called him frequently, and went on to opine that it bordered on 'harassment'.

I LOVE how in this day and age everyone and their uncle, because of all these court shows on TV suddenly think that they're lawyers all of a sudden. Harassment my A**! If he (or she, for that matter) had simply returned just one of my messages, told me not to call back, and I had continued to do so THAT would be 'harassment' I explained that Frances gave me Toad's Cel # so that I could arrange to at least look at the arbors, and I only came over there BECAUSE no one called back. For all I knew I I could have copied the # down wrong. She then went on a rant about how Frances had 'No right' to give out Toad's cel# .

Never mind the fact that I had been told that I had to be 'let onto' the property. Which I took to mean that they were secured in a garage, storage shed, etc. I was just trying to respect their landlord, the owner of the properties' wishes. She (let's call her 'Kitty') pointed out that I didn't even have a ride at that time to haul away the arbors (Well DUH!!!) even though I explained that I just wanted to find out where they were on the property, and ascertain their condition before making any further arrangements. Long story short (and yes, this IS the short version) that if and when I got a ride, to come over and pick them up, I gave her a tentative date, next Thursday or Friday, to which she said 'fine'. She went on to emphasize that any further arrangements, such as paying for, viewing, picking up, etc was to solely betwixt myself and Frances, and to essentially 'leave them out of it...

GLADLY!!! *Whew*

There you go rant over, you citizens can get on with your lives, nothing more to see here...

Sheesh! I think your descriptions are pretty accurate! What a pain!

Originally Posted by lisa48317

Sheesh! I think your descriptions are pretty accurate! What a pain!

That's not the half of it, lisa...

I just got off the phone with Frances. Apparently Todd isn't even man enough to confront me about my 'alleged' harassment over the phone. He IS however 'Man' enough to call up Frances, and in turn harass a poor old woman whose only two possible mistakes were:

1.) Giving out Todd's cel # to me

2.) Being in the financial situation where she had to rent out her property to these two individuals.

I could practically hear, even with the bad connection, the fear in her voice. I have no proof of this, but I strongly believe that Todd may have even threatened to either break the lease/rental agreement, and perhaps even legal action for giving out his cel #.

She said (as told to her by Todd, apparently) that I had been 'belligerent' , which is odd, because I never actually spoke directly to Todd yesterday. I spoke to a very belligerent 'Kitty' (still never got her to tell me her name) outside the house. So unless he was inside listening to our conversation, there's no way he could know.

I wondered when I saw two of the front windows on the house that were open, why someone would leave the house unattended like that. But I digress... she continued to explain that, apparently, (according to Todd, of course) that I 'allegedly' threatened him.

Bull****!

I never at ANY time EVER said anything about harming him physically in any way. I was always the victim of bullies in school, not the other way around. That hasn't changed now that I am an adult. Near as I can figure, I probably walked approximately two or three miles that day. That's about 3 times more that I usually do, and twice what I should've had to i the first place. I ended up lame, stiff and sore the rest of the day, and I am still not 100% today.

Anyway, she went on to say that she can't afford to have him be so upset, and so she asked me not to bother/contact him again. She also withdrew the offer to let me buy the arbors.

While I AM still steamed about this (and I think rightfully so) What bothers me just as much is how hypocritical Todd and his 'roommate' were. They expected me to treat them with a certain level of respect as my elders. I can only assume, basing this on the fact that he is probably more or less the same age as her. When they didn't think that they got that level of respect, they got hostile and in their own words, 'belligerent'.

Then Todd, showing the same level of 'alleged' disrespect to Frances, who is their elder, and dressing her down over the phone as he did....

Classy Todd, real classy...

*sigh*

Thanks guys, I appreciate being able to vent these last couple of days, Seriously....

I guess that stuck-up attitude must have come naturally to her on Dharma and Greg, no acting lessons required. Sorry about your experience, Thom

Meh, I'm almost over it now. On a related note, jdubbya, who lives about 5 or 6 block away from these people, has been a champ. He offered to make a separate trip across town and back once he delivered the fence panels, to pick up and haul the arbors for me. He is everything THEY were NOT. I just wanted to put that out there. Seriously j, you are what these forums are all about....

I can sympathize and I lol's at your story (how you wrote it) but less funny was their lying and trifling ways. I shake my head at the callousness of these people. Theres some doozys down here like that too. Really suspicious, rude and self absorbed.

The only thing I would have done differently, no matter how much I wanted to buy from a non retail individual, is have called or emailed the one time.

If no reply in 3-5 days I give up, because if they cant be bothered to return a quick email I will assume they are a- sick, b- traveling, c- really busy, d- jerks. At least thats how it goes in my head, lol.

if I do get a reply after initial contact and the sale isnt taken care of quickly, Ive learned that I might as well forget about the item.

I cant tell you how many times after initial contact and reply then waiting on a address or time to come over quickly ends a sale. I wonder if they really want to sell the item or not, why even bother initially?

Care to post Toads number here so we can call him up and say hello...LOL!!!!

It's always a gamble responding to any type of "for sale" ad. You never know who you're going to encounter. The arbor deal was a good one but not worth the aggravation. Thanks for the kind words, Thom. My pleasure to help out a fellow haunter. The fence panels are almost done so expect delivery sometime this week. You still have a couple months to come up with an entrance way of some sort.

I have owned rental properties for quite a while now and I would say Toad and Kitty are up to something and are paranoid. You're just an innocent victim and so is Francis, I'd say. Who knows what goes on behind closed doors there. Some people are weird. Not weird like all of us here but actually nuts! You meet them and feel like it isn't possible for them to be that crazy and not be put away. Could you just pay Francis, then go over there and load them up? If she owns the property and is selling something off of it and gives you permission, go get it. Tell her to call and leave them a message 24 hrs. before letting them know you'll be coming. My bet is they would never call the cops.

Originally Posted by creepyhomemaker

I have owned rental properties for quite a while now and I would say Toad and Kitty are up to something and are paranoid. You're just an innocent victim and so is Francis, I'd say. Who knows what goes on behind closed doors there. Some people are weird. Not weird like all of us here but actually nuts! You meet them and feel like it isn't possible for them to be that crazy and not be put away. Could you just pay Francis, then go over there and load them up? If she owns the property and is selling something off of it and gives you permission, go get it. Tell her to call and leave them a message 24 hrs. before letting them know you'll be coming. My bet is they would never call the cops.

get a receipt just in case they do!