"Witch it out"

OK, so those of you who are fairly close to us (either in proximity or in relationship) have heard our recent frustrations about our well and its slow refresh rate. To make a long story short, our property disclosure didn't quite disclose the whole truth about just how slow our refresh rate is. The bottom line is that we ran out of water the other day after having done only one load of laundry and having taken only one shower (Josh was working nights and hadn't showered yet for the day). We called in a professional to diagnose the problem, and we feared the worst: digging a new well.

We had a recommendation for a good water problems/well drilling company, so we put in a call for service and a portly middle-aged man came on out. First of all, he was like a thinner version of Chris Farley... the kind of guy who puts his hat on his neck and then pulls forward, so his hair is actually pulled up from his neckline into his hat. I don't know why, that just really bugs me. Anyway, he was filthy. Dirty hands, sure, but this guy had mud all over his jeans and who knows what else on his sweatshirt... I shudder to think. He was pleasant enough, though, and I respect a person who knows a lot about things I can't begin to understand. He found his way to our water pump and the sort of guages he was interested in, and set to work.

Now we'll skip to the highlights. At one point, we asked him if he thought we ought to drill a new well. (He had commented that most wells in our area have very, very slow refresh rates, so I was wondering aloud if drilling a deeper well would be at all beneficial.) He said, "Well, at this point, I'm not sure ya hafta, but if y'all deed, I would wanna be sure you git someone in here to witch it out . . . whether y'all b'lieve in that er not, ya gotta have someone come in and witch it out." Forgive me, those of you who immediately understand what he was suggesting. I was clueless. I was picturing some large piece of equipment that would witch, or widge, or whatever, the sides of the well so that it was ... better. Or something. I was not thinking about an actual witch walking around our property with two sticks, waiting for them to cross. You may find this humorous; personally, I wanted to pee my pants once I'd realized what he meant. He went on and on and ON about witching out your well, and how you have to ask the sticks "real spissific questions, mmkay" - it was insane. I thought to myself, You are about to overstay your welcome. Fix our immediate problem and get out.

So the time comes for the gentle man to leave. He walks to the door and says to Josh, "How you wanna pay me?" Somewhat taken aback, Josh said, "Well... what's the damage?" In his head, Josh later told me, he was thinking, oh, fifty bucks. The guy says, "Well. You gimme cash, a hundred bucks. You want to pay credit, I gotta charge ya one twenty-five." I was in the kitchen at this point, with my jaw on the counter (A HUNDRED BUCKS FOR YOU TO COME IN HERE AND SUGGEST WE witch it out? HA!). I don't even remember what Josh said, but he's the sort of guy who keeps an emergency stash (I have no idea where), so he brought the guy one hundred dollars in cash. He handed it over, and the man slipped it into his pocket.

Nuh-uh. This is not happening. Not in my house. You're kidding me! You don't walk into someone's house, ask for a hundred bucks, slip it into your pocket, and walk out. No way. So I say, "Do you have some sort of write-up that you do? You know, like, saying what you did, and that we paid you for it, that sort of thing?" He stared at me blankly as if I had just told him I didn't want to steal cable. I don't know if he flat-out asked, but I felt the need to explain. I just said, "You know, we're not real happy about the way this was disclosed in our paperwork when we bought this house, so we'd like to have some documentation of what we've had to have done." He said, "Well... yeah... I got a bank pad in me truck." I said, "Oh, OK. That would work."
And he started talking to Josh about something else! So I said, again, "Yeah, if you could just get us something that would show that we had you in, and that we paid you for your service...."

So the guy went out to his truck and wrote something up and wrote 100 at the bottom. Granted, he did end up diagnosing a problem, and seems to have fixed it... but I'd be interested to call the same company tomorrow and ask what their standard rate is for a service call, and see if that cool 100 went any farther than his pocket...