THE RETURN OF MR WEARING

4 April 2016

Surprisingly warm 18 degrees

Back in February, a client whom I referred to as Mr Wearing came over

http://normalreloaded.blogspot.fr/2016/02/i-am-worn-down-by-mr-wearing.html

And now he was back with his wife.  Surely she would be more verbose?  Or how would they ever make a life together??  She was, I am relieved to tell you, an utterly charming lady with an easy manner and an engaging personality.  

It was late by the time they arrived in my town and we only got to see one property.  She had some difficulty getting up the stairs but I attributed it to the slideliness of the paint and the fact that she had been awake already for 13 hours.  We had a drink on the terrasse of the Grand Hotel and they went in for dinner and me for a short evening and then it was Day Two and the rest of the houses which Mr W had selected, plus one I had slotted in.

It rained torrentially in the night, but the day dawned and the sun came out from the heavy clouds and they were waiting for me in the car park, looking refreshed and ready to roll.  I let Mrs W do the talking and Mr W just stood around with his hands in his coat pockets.

We drove to the first house, which was one I had fitted it.  Belonging to a gay man, it was in perfect order and clean to the point which I have yet to achieve in thirty years of marriage.  This house has a downstairs granny flat and Mrs W was very taken with it.  She again, had difficulty with the stairs and when we got back into the car, I asked her about this and she said she had arthritis and balance problems.

I was horrified.  How will you manage with the corkscrew staircase in the next house we are going now to see?  I asked.  She looked at Mr W - there is a corkscrew staircase??  He chewed his lip and said 'its very pretty'.  We went and she thought the house was far too isolated and she had terrible, terrible trouble getting up the stairs.

They followed me back to the big town, where I was about to put them back onto the autoroute to go home.  What I had not realised about Mr W is that he is a totally impractical person.  He had chosen houses he liked with no reference to the needs of his wife.  Each house had had chosen was completely unsuitable.  I was absolutely livid.  We got to the town and went for a quick sandwich in Leclerc and I did a useful exercise which is to get people to list three essential qualities for a house and then two useful ones.  I then got them to mark them out of ten and added them up.  

The house I had chosen was way out in front.  The lady loved it.  Mr W said he could love it.  Possibly.  They went one way and I went back home and was in a totally foul mood and went for a swim to get rid of my fury.  Then I just felt tired and depressed.