Hi! I know I’ve been away a long time but nothing hit me to blog about. That just changed. It’s 11:00 on Tuesday morning. My doorbell just rang, and rang, and rang. As usual, I stood stalk still thinking if I don’t move, they won’t know I’m in here. Of course I was in the office which is right by the front door and it has those double doors with the glass panes (French doors, I think) and if they are opened just right you can see my reflection from the front door. Then the jig is up, they know I’m home. But you know what – I STILL don’t answer my door. I refuse to answer my door unless I know you are coming over and/or I know who you are. I do answer and ALMOST always buy from kids selling girl scout cookies or that cheap fundraiser stuff. I can rarely turn a little kid down. Other than that, I’ve been burned too many times by door to door “magazine” salesmen or the guys that want you to buy their new miracle product, OR the “can you help me out I’m going to go out into the world and learn how to be a grown up” guys. It used to be hard for me to say no but I’ve gotten to the point that I can and do say no. It’s almost always unpleasant and they get angry and sometimes even scare me a little so now, I just refuse to open my door. There was the guy that came to my door pretending to be handicapped with some sort of disability like cerebral palsy which causes issues with walking and talking. This guy was suspect right away because he was dressed in very flashy and expensive clothes, too “polished”. He confirmed my suspicions because after I told him no SEVERAL times, he said, perfectly clear “OK, well, do you have any neighbors that are nice?” At that point I didn’t know whether to scold him for being a con-man or to compliment him on his acting skills – even though he should have stayed in character through the whole performance. Then there was the time that Ed was outside working in the yard (hard to hide when you are outside) and some guy walks up to him with his little holster full of spray bottles which were full of miracle solvent and asked “sir, do you want me to get that oil stain off your driveway?” Ed said “no”. The guy was incredulous “You DON’T want the oil stain off your drive?” Ed – “no”. The guy finally left. I know these guys need to make a living but in this day and age, door to door is not a good idea and 9 times out of 10 these guys are running some kind of con or they want to bust in and hurt/steal/maim. Paranoid? Maybe but I’ve read too many scary stories. If they’ve come to tell me I’ve won the Publishers Clearinghouse Sweepstakes (RIP Ed McMahon), then I guess I’ll just lose out or they can contact me by mail.
My favorite is the time the doorbell rang and rang and rang and I just wasn’t going to answer. I wasn’t in the mood to argue with some grown man trying to go to Florida with his baseball team. Then I hear Morgan yell “Mom, it’s the pizza guy!” “Oh Crap!”. I guess I ought to go to the door for pizza. In my defense, I ordered the pizza 45 minutes earlier and I just forgot. At some point I should really blog about my memory issues.
I don’t mean to be rude, unkind, harsh, or any of those things. I just don’t think it’s safe or wise to answer the door in the middle of the day when you’re by yourself (or not) unless, of course, it’s the pizza guy. God Bless!
Hey, good to see you’re back. Good post. But sometimes it is better to answer the door. Last winter a guy came up and rang the doorbell (we have a long drive with a gate but the gate had blown open and was broken) and said he was looking for “so and so” and I asked him what address he was looking for and he mumbled, put his head down, got on his phone and took off in his pick-up. Turns out there were several break-ins in the area around that time and he was looking for homes with nobody home. Had I ignored him, he might have come on in, breaking down the door. It did take me a little time to answer the door (I was downstairs) but I hate to think if he had come on in thinking I wasn’t there. I still lie awake at night wondering all the “what-ifs” of that incident! Darned if you do and darned if you don’t!
Hope you’re having a great summer so far!
p.s. they did catch the guy because I called and filed a report and he broke in a house down the road later that same day. Same guy, same truck.
YAYYAYAY you updated, the people are happy : )
I never answer the door to a stranger when I am home alone, but I really hate it when my doorbell rings at around noon and I am still in my robe!! We have had several break-ins in our neighborhood in the last few weeks in broad daylight, but I just refuse to open the door for strangers. I figure if they start to break in the front, I will run out the back and if they break in the front…well they are idiots, because everyone can see my front door from the road.
I didn’t get an update email. Grr
Thankfully here, it’s illegal for anyone to do door to door sales. It’s a city thing. So if someone comes to the door then we can just call the cops, and off they go. However, we still get those scam ones that try to sell magazines and say they are going to Europe or something, and that you can send the magazines to some childrens hospital, but never mention the hospital. Or that they have relatives on say the other street. Which they don’t know, but most of all the people that live on our two streets have been here 20+ years. So even if we don’t know each other personally, we know who drives what, etc.
Or we get the annoying meat guys. I always tell them I’m a vegetarian, and that my husband is also one by proxy because I’m the one that cooks. lol
I usually do answer my door. But only because like I said, we don’t get many door to door. So it’s usually a neighbor, and they don’t knock often. And if my van is here, they know I’m home too. Hard to pretend I’m not home then.