The Old Coot’s friend is a squeaker

By Merlin Lessler —

My friend Matt, I won’t mention that his last name is Laba, recently bought a new sofa. Sofas cost a lot of money, and you want them to be perfect. It wasn’t. It squeaked every time he sat or moved on it. He had the store pick it up and take it back to the store to remove the squeaks.

When they brought it back, it still squeaked. So, he told them to bring a brand new sofa. They did. Guess what? It squeaked.

The company escalated his complaint and sent an expert to his house to figure out what was going on. She sat on it; it squeaked. She looked down and noticed the coasters under each leg it was resting on to protect his new floor. She asked him to remove them. Then she sat on it; no more squeaks. Much to Matt’s chagrin, it was the coasters that squeaked.

This isn’t a unique experience for Matt. It’s happened before. Several years ago, I wrote about a similar experience Matt had. I inadvertently mentioned that his last name was Laba then too.

Anyhow, he asked his wife Linda to have some copies made for him. When she brought them home, he noticed that they hadn’t copied the backside of the originals. He was irked, to say the least.

He stormed out of the house and demanded that they remake the copies and told them, “I’m not going to pay for it!” The poor clerk was frightened, let out a few squeaks (see how I tied that into the sofa story) apologized profusely, and immediately remade the copies, both sides this time.

When Matt got home and told Linda that he’d rectified the problem at the office supply store, Linda looked him dead in the eye (I made that up; I  don’t know how she looked at him), and said, “I didn’t have the copies made at the office supply store; I had them made at the screen printer’s shop.”

When you do business with Matt, be prepared to squeak.   

Complaints? Comments? Drop them at mlessler7@gmail.com.