There wasn’t much progress in the master bedroom yesterday. I made sure the paint on the walls was covering every nook and cranny and began to scrape the mystery goo off the window frames. This glue-like substance was apparently applied as if it was protecting them from poisonous gas outdoors. I wouldn’t have wanted them to miss an inch and risk leaving a small portion of the house intact.

On to more important business … a good story dating back to Day 26. I never explained Cool Hand Luke’s name to you. My most entertaining carpenter/contractor, Cool Hand Luke, is the guy who has skim coated my kitchen ceiling (unsuccessfully), built walls in the media room, rebuilt the same walls in the media room (don’t worry, they’re still crooked), patched a few walls (he was good at the ones he actually finished), and a few other odd jobs.

While working on the media room/studio, Luke’s lunches started to longer, his smoke breaks more frequent, and his accuracy nonexistent. One typical workday he said he was going to lunch for an hour. He disappeared for over two hours until we got the fated phone call. Luke was on his cell phone and told my husband something to the effect of, “I was in an accident. I’m getting arrested. Can you come over here and get my truck?” No explanation, just his location, which happened to be right at the entrance to our housing development … sorry, our neighborhood. Let’s take a second and go over the puzzlers that went through my head at this moment.

1. $&*%! Am I being punked?
2. I couldn’t even get the LA cops to take a report after my accident, yet he’s getting arrested. This is not a promising sign.
3. When in a motor vehicle accident, I’m pretty confident another person can’t just drive away in the vehicle that caused the accident. (If you knew Luke, the assumption that he was at fault would make perfect sense.)
4. Do I really want to involve myself in this sure-to-be Jerry Springer meets Intervention of a situation?
5. Who calls their employer to announce a probable incarceration? Isn’t this an event you might conveniently omit from the stories about what you did on your lunch hour?
6. I guess this means he’s not coming back after lunch.

Despite our better judgment, we went to the scene to find the police administering a sobriety test to our beloved Cool Hand Luke. I introduced myself to the guy he hit (we’ll call him Vic, as in “the vic”), only to discover Vic lived a few doors down from me. Hi neighbor! According to Vic, Luke tried to take off after giving him a fake ID. Vic was not hurt and, luckily, super cool about the situation, but I’m not expecting an invite to his next barbecue. By this time we had attracted a welcome wagon consisting of 3 cruisers, at least four uniformed officers, and a detective. The detective gave us the skinny on Luke’s situation.

Driver’s license: revoked a long time ago
Insurance: Ha!
Adult beverages accompanying the hot dog at lunch: more than enough to put a donkey on its ass (pun intended)
Luke’s truck: headed for the impound
Luke: headed for the drunk tank

After a couple of nights on the farm, Luke called. I picked up the call and I hear, “Do I still have a job?” There wasn’t an offer of, “Sorry I introduced you to your neighbor via attempted vehicular manslaughter” or, “Did you recognize your blurred out face on ‘COPS’ last night?”. Nada. Forced against the wall by a ticking clock to finish the project before my husband’s clients flew in, we told him to come over to continue work, but no more brass monkey and he’d better find a bus line.

Once the room was complete Luke went on a much-needed vacation, which I just realized was probably a gross violation of the terms of his bail. When he got back, he showed up at our door demanding more money to continue work. I’m still wondering what increased his value after that stunt. Was he using the reward amount listed on the wanted posters? Captain said it best, “Now, I can be a good guy, or I can be one real mean son of a bitch.” Take a guess which route I took.

We still get calls from Luke asking for work, but the requests are a bit more humble now. We haven’t taken him up on any of his offers. I’m not sure I want my address listed as an acceptable geotag for his ankle bracelet.

I am going to keep a running count of the contractors I hire that can use a mug shot as their W-9 proof of identification. So far we’re at 2 out of 7.