Home Contractors and Worker Staff: Do this don't do that

O.K.  I need a medium to grip about the ins and outs and experiences with home contractors, their staff and home care taker types of staff.  So, here I go.  Let'er rip!

In this blog entry, I focus on "Do this and don't do that..."  This entry is related to a very enterprising and nice teen from the neighborhood trying to drum up lawn mowing and yard care business.

First time over, I walk him around the yard to make certain he knows where the property boundaries are located and to show him a sprinkler electrical wire that is exposed at the edge of a garden bed "See this, this is a wire for the sprinkler system.  Please be careful and don't cut this."  "These weeds near the composting bin are out of control and need to be mowed down."

Can you guess what occurs?

Of course:

The cable with the electrical wires for the sprinkler system gets cut and he doesn't tell me.
That healthy patch of weeds doesn't get mowed, as he thinks they are flowers, even though I told them they are weeds and I want him to mow them down.

A week later, I am out mowing the lawn, myself, once again.

Why, because his method of mowing a lawn wasn't to cover the whole lawn in consecutive strips with the mower.  It was a random job probably dictated by what he felt "required" mowing.

So, he's a teen.  Nice kid.  Wants to work.

I next give him a chance at weeding a garden bed.  Tell him my preference is that I pay him by the hour.  But, he insists that it might take him longer than I would anticipate and therefore he'd prefer $50 for the job.

O.K.  Kid.  Go to it.

It takes him a few days after his daytime job to spend brief periods of time weeding prior to the sun setting.  The final evening he is out there in the dark finishing up.

It's dark.  I pay the kid his $50.

Check out the work in the daylight.  Well, he left some tall flowering weeds.  Sort of wondering if he actually got the roots when he did the work.

Two weeks later, there is the answer growing full force.

Breaking off and cutting weeds....  It isn't "weeding".

Nice try.  No thanks, I can do it myself next time.