Jeff, that would probably cost more than we can afford. It was a solid oak desk. We don’t exactly have a whole lot of money, and more than we can afford is currently going to a lawyer on another matter. Yeah, dh will probably realize that we can’t afford to sue the bastard, either. Thanks anyway, though.
Opal, it has been several days, and I am wondering when someone is going to say something to this jackass. It isn’t like my in-laws to just leave something unsaid like this. That sounds more like MY family. Personally, I’d like to see someone let dh and my brother-in-law take him out back and beat some manners into him – and I usually hate that kind of thing.
they will never say anything to the jerk is my guess. i think sil probably was laughing as he took the pick to the furniture. she never thot of it’s value, just the laughs.
is she a druggie and pregnant by this guy at the same time?
if hubby is really close to his family and doesn’t want to scrape them off, he’d do well to visit when sis isn’t there.
he had better get EVERYTHING that he values out of the house right now.
Details.
What kind of desk?
Many posters suggest it is a metal and wood combination schoolhouse type desk.
Is that what it is?
Is it the type that has the chair attached?
The writing surface is hinged, and encloses a compartment below?
Solid oak you say?
Avoid the following pitfall:
Over the years many customers came to me with repair jobs saying something like, “Oh, I just knew you couldn’t use that little broken piece. After all, it was nothing more than a splinter.”
Don’t do that.
Save all the pieces.
Let somebody competent decide if they are useable pieces.
My regret for you:
Yeah, it’s probably going to be expensive.
Handsomeharry, as upset as I am at her boyfriend, I don’t actually appreciate you assuming things like that about my husband’s sister. She is a good mom to her kids. She is not a druggie, and the idea that she would take drugs (or even drink) while pregnant is absurd. She was not around when this happened – she would have stopped him. In short, the only thing she did wrong was have bad taste. Please do not saying anything else about my sister-in-law lest I feel the need to hurt you.
Forbin, no, it’s just a desk. Not a schooldesk, just a desk. That’s why I’m pretty sure that there’s nothing left to save. All of the wood is wrecked, and the only metal bits would be the drawer handles.
Cessandra, your in-laws are fucking stupid. Not for hiring this guy in the first place, but for NOT FIRING HIM ON THE SPOT!
He’s got them by the balls? Puh-leeze. I’ve got a pal near your neck of the woods who’d be more than happy to do the work, as long as he could find wheels. I’m sure there are lots of people in the area who would do the same.
OK, you’ve decided that the desk is a total loss. A new desk to look like the old one would be a great present for dh if and you get the money for it eventually. Only do this if you have any photos around to use as a reference.
How does he have them by the balls? Does he have photographic evidence of them doing something really kinky or illegal or something? FIRE THAT FUCKER!!
Has them by the balls? In what way? Is he seven feet tall and an ex-mafia hit man? Does he have photos of them comitting unspeakable acts that he’ll publish in the local paper? Has he sacrificed a black goat under the new moon and called down the wrath of Cthulhu on any who oppose him?
Your in-laws have every right to fire him. Just because he’s SIL’s boyfriend doesn’t mean he’s immune to the consequences of his actions. Yeah, it’ll make family interactions tough–but then, so does willfully destroying valuable furniture that belongs to your girlfriend’s family.
Your in-laws also have every right to sit down with this guy and explain that not only is he fired, he owes them money. If the desks had been damaged by accident, I can see that they wouldn’t want to blame him for it, but thrown out a window is not an accident. Pickaxed is not an accident. And I think your in-laws should be clear about this up front, before more stuff like this happens in the future and they’ve set a precedent of allowing him to do this kind of thing.
I also wonder what else is going on here. Not that you’ve deliberately left anything out of your post, but that there must be something else going on with the BF that induces him to behave this way. Hell, I married into a family with a brother in law who has rocks for brains and lives for the moment he can get his chainsaw out. And he would never do anything like that. He gleefully destroys anything we ask him to (and that’s come in handy on occasion), but he would never just go after a piece of furniture without asking first. And I’m assuming the BF here is smarter than Mr. Cameron’s BIL, because most vertebrates are. Is there some kind of tension between the in-laws and BF? Or what? Because what he did is just inexplicable.
The only indicator of defectiveness here is the obvious inability to distinguish between domestic beer and a domestic mass-market beer.
Fat Tire, brewed in Colorado, is a domestic beer. But they avoid using additives like corn syrup and rice and don’t produce millions of cans a year.
Coors, also brewed in Colorado, is also a domestic beer. They, on the other hand, use all sorts of nasty additives that have no business being in a brew and they mass-produce it. Coors is therefore a mass-market beer.
An affinity for domestic beer is not necessarily a bad thing, unless that particular beer is a mass-market brew.
Oh, Cessandra, my sincerest sympathies over this situation. The only thing worse than destruction with malice aforethought is destruction without any thought whatsoever. Your in-laws really should have taken him to task over this, at the least, or fired his ass on the spot. There’s absolutely no reason to tolerate any of that, unless they really didn’t care what happened to any of the furniture.
I really didn’t want to reveal this, but, basically he is cleaning their house illegally. They couldn’t go to jail or anything, but if the insurance company finds out that he has been cleaning the mold while there is still furniture in the house, they won’t get a cent. The reason they’ve been doing it this way is that they’ve been told that they must be finished before their current policy expires, or the company won’t pay. And, like I said, they’ve been moving stuff out for months. So if they fire him, they’d have to find someone else to do it illegally. If they withold money from him, he can go to the insurance company, and they will be screwed.
Still, I really don’t understand why no one has said anything yet. I have NEVER seen this family not address a problem like this before. They are not the holding it in, keeping it to ourselves types.
Opal, I have no idea what prompted this. The only thing that I can think of is that he must have thought the desks were not wanted. WHY he thought that , I have no idea.
PS, my in-laws are normally very honest people, and they are not lazy. If you had seen their house before this, you would know why it has been taking so long. They never throw anything away!
Just a tiny question pops into my mind, I’ve cleaned out my mom’s house several times. She has a sad habit of filling it top to bottom with junk, furniture and piles and piles of stuff to the ceiling. Every room, hallway, basement, nook and cranny. Maybe, just maybe, he’d been working hard and just got burned out by all the stuff. I’m not accusing your parents of being pack-rats, but you said that they had “ALOT of crap in their house”. So I was reminded of my mom’s basement. After I moved the 4th couch, 6th chair, 3rd desk, 3rd bed and such, all covered in mold and rot, I stopped caring if any of it was still good. I just threw it out. A nasty stinky job that I’ll hate to repeat. Maybe he was in a simular situation.
Or he could be an idiot. Have you considered just asking him what happened? (without calling him a neanderthal, at first), tell him of your distress and let him know about something else you want saved so he doesn’t destroy that as well.
Um… maybe because it was stuffed in a crap-filled house covered with mold since your husband was a small lad doing his homework? Why would he think it was wanted?
Just trying to think outside the box, based on my above-mentioned experience.
Just to be clear, the mold is inside their walls only. The desk was not moldy – none of their stuff was moldy. And when I say they had a lot of crap, they just have a lot of stuff. Enough that it takes three months to move. That doesn’t mean that their stuff was in a condition where it needed to be thrown out. Both desks were in fine condition.
