Robin Stevens wrote: > One of my memorable payments for a tuning was for tuning a Player piano. > > When I finished the old man said to me..."I can't pay you"...But, I > can give you a First World War .303 rifle and a violin!! > > It suited me fine, as I was into target shooting in my younger days. > The rifle had a good quality target shooting scope. It even had > "Mother" engraved on the butt. > As for the violin...I have never used it. > > Robin Stevens > > /-------Original Message-------/ > > /*From:*/ Pianotech <mailto:pianotech@ptg.org> > /*Date:*/ 07/05/05 16:52:22 > /*To:*/ tune4u@earthlink.net <mailto:tune4u@earthlink.net>; Pianotech > <mailto:pianotech@ptg.org> > /*Subject:*/ Re: Sweet! > > At 10:49 PM 7/4/2005 -0500, you wrote: > >What's the best or most unusual "extra" you've been offered. > > The dentist's wife gave me a big plastic bowl full of sticky candy! Maybe > she was trying to drum up business? > > Down in Stockton, CA I got a big grocery bag of walnuts in the shell, new > crop. Delicious, easy to break open. And somebody gave me some elk heart > and liver once, frozen, luckily. Flowers, big bundles of them. Cookies > (usually I don't get home with them.) A dozen eggs from her own chickens. > Plants! Shasta daisies, autumn crocus, iris, etc. One family nearby, on > land which the lady's grandparents had settled, with 100-year-old giant > sequoias her grandfather had planted, gave me starts of the local bleeding > heart (cutleaf, a bucket full of little starts, I had to run home and > plant > them pronto), the native currant with some of the duff from under the > sequoia to make it feel at home, and a walnut tree bred by a 90-year-old > local retired prof. They had gotten it at a class they took, and > planted it > a bad place. All this stuff thrived, and the bleeding heart hitched a ride > with the hostas when I moved them to my new house. > > Several customers have given me old tools and supplies from tuner > relatives, long dead ones. Usually they smelled fusty from damp storage, > but some are really neat old 19th century stuff. I also found a nice old > letoff tool under an inch of dust on the floor of an old upright, which I > was told I was welcome to keep. Rosewood handle, brass ferule, nicely > shaped so it doesn't bend the eyelet as easily as the new ones. > > This isn't a tip from anyone, but after tuning at a big apartment complex, > I found a beautiful big Japanese beechwood rocking chair just dumped > in the > dumpster. It took me twenty minutes to rearrange my Tercel hatchback > enough > to fit it in. I had to get it foam for cushions, and upholstery > fabric, but > I've used it ever since. Here's Donnie Byrd sitting in it, when she > visited > and we worked on a grand action together. > > Grapes. Meyer lemons, by the bag. (delicious, so mild!) I really miss the > Meyer lemons. If I make a greenhouse, I'll plant one. Apples, also by the > bag. Plums. A couple of really good nursery catalogs. A video of the life > of Christ. I gave it to a Sunday School. > > Newly arrived in Oregon, way out east in Sweet Home, somebody raided his > woodpile (He had a cast iron stove), and gave me beautiful big hunks of > cherry, walnut, maple, and (the real treat!) several big rounds of clear > Pacific Yew, garnered from slash piles. They were stripping the bark back > then to make taxol for cancer patients. What a waste! Glad when they > synthesized the stuff. I called him a couple of years later to see if > there > was any more yew, but it was all gone. > > Back when I was just starting in the business, a customer out in the > country, sort of run-down place, heard me talk about getting tools, and he > reached down and picked up an old, rusty, bent chisel from the gravel > driveway (nylon handle, though) and handed it to me. "There! Now > you've got > a chisel." <grin> I took it home, unbent it, ground a new bevel, blasted > the rust off it, more or less, sharpened it, and have used it more > than any > of the good ones ever since. It was such a wreck I never had to worry > about > what I did with it. > > Okay, now, what's the most unusual thing you have _given_ to customers? I > gave one of mine two Washington hawthorn seedlings, which she says have > grown well. Another's daughter found a home for two huge miniature rose > bushes which I was eager to get rid of. > > Susan > > > > > jeez......in 25 years I've gotten maybe a dozen cookies and 4 or 5 tomatoes....oh, and an old dehumidifier rod or two, usually with the cord so cracked and brittle that it's unsable. And once in a great while they write the check for $5 or $10 over what I asked. --D.N.
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